Vile Little Dungbeetle

Dungbeetles occur on every continent except Antarctica

Dung beetle - Kheper aegyptiorum

Ancient Egyptians revered the scarab (dung beetle). They credited it with keeping the earth revolving like a giant ball of dung.

Much earlier than the Egyptians, 10, 000 to 20, 000 years ago, dung beetles were revered by Shamanic cultures, often as The Creator.

Behaviour:

There are three main types of dung beetles: the rollers, the tunnellers and the dwellers that live in the dung. K. aegyptiorum is a roller - a strategy recognised as being evolutionarily the most advanced. They generally follow mammals by flying upwind towards the scent of dung. Their sense of smell is acute and their eyes are divided in half for ground vision and polarised light vision. Dung beetles are usually solitary apart from the short time they spend with their partners prior to mating.


Reproduction:

The rollers establish a pair bond. They usually meet in the dung pat. The male offers the female a giant-sized brood ball which if accepted, they roll away together, or with the female riding on the ball. During this time, other beetles often attempt to steel the ball. They find a soft place and bury the ball before mating - mostly underground. The male then leaves to find further partners. The female of this species makes a brood 'pear' or 'pears' and lays a single egg in each. She then coats the pear with an antiseptic mixture of dung, saliva and faeces to seal it in a case which hardens solid. Unusual in insects, this species exhibits the highest level of parental care seen in an insect. She stays with the ball and her grub for two months, cleaning it and removing its faeces, fungi and bacteria.


Additional notes:

Up to 16,000 dung beetles have been counted in one 1.5kg heap of elephant dung. One dung beetle can bury 250 times its own weight in a night.






http://www.bbc.co.uk/nature/wildfacts/factfiles/498.shtml

posted by Tilted @ 12:24 pm 0 comments

Queens

Well well. What a complete and utter waste of time and effort on my part. Misleading and lying all along. What a bitch. Thank goodness it's over, earlier.

But the whole point of this entry is to thank viv and germ (in no particular order). It's moments like these that cranky old coots with dodgy memory, like myself, will always remember.


This is for the both of you hotstuffs. Cheers.

posted by Tilted @ 8:11 pm 0 comments

so

I quote: "I usally banish a white russian from his kremlin whenever I feel inclined to."

Or is that a rocket in your pocket?

posted by Tilted @ 7:20 pm 0 comments

pipe

in the ancient world before the advent of daily newspapers or indeed written language itself, news of major events was carved on stone tablets in the form of hieroglyphs. although if there was any news not concerning a bird, a cat, a big eye, and a man in a skirt doing an impression of a teapot, the egyptians certainly never reported it.

posted by Tilted @ 10:51 am 0 comments

the fascinating world of the restaurant waiter. what a skilled profession that is. surely no other job requires the ability to spot two people coming into a restaurant at lunch time, sum up the situation in an instant and say:

"table for two?"

posted by Tilted @ 3:52 pm 4 comments