Dung beetles belong to the family Scarabaeoidea or Scarab Beetles. The are called so because of their habit of rolling animal dung into balls which are used as food or brooding chambers. Their role in agriculture is of remarkable importance as the burying and consumption of dung by the beetles improves nutrient recycling and soil structure. Currently, these are the only insects known to navigate and orient themselves using the Milky Way! The proportion of their body weights to the loads they carry is about the same as that of a human being and a truck!
This work by Rohan Chakravarty is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs 3.0 Unported License.
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