Welcome back to our channel, and to episode 6 of Safari Self Drive.
Sometimes the smallest creatures can provide safari entertainment!
We came across this dung beetle rolling a huge ball of dung across the road, watch as it loses
its ball and after some panic finds it again. Apologies for the background commentary,
I was quite excited and was hoping to encourage this little guy!
The strength and tenacity of these beetles is amazing, rolling the ball of dung,
sometimes more than 50 times its body weight, over obstacles and up steep embankments.
An important fact to remember when on a safari drive is don't drive over poop lying in the road.
The dung of all animals will host a myriad of lives,
from moths to fungi and hard-working little beetles like this one.
Dung beetles are the cleanup crews of the bushveld.
Able to carry off and scatter pile of dung in an amazingly short time.
The dung is buried in the ground where it decomposes, aerating and fertilizing the soil.
The removal of dung also minimises the number of flies,
so these beetles are extremely useful in maintaining a healthy environment.
Dung beetles can be broken down into four distinct groups according to how they dispose of the dung.
They are either Telecoprids, rollers,
who roll the dung into balls and they bury the balls in the soft soil.
Paracoprids, or burrowers, take the dung into tunnels directly under the main heap.
Endocoprids, or dwellers, who actually live in the dung
and Kleptocoprids, who steal the balls from the rollers and lay their eggs in the stolen ball.
This little guy is a Telecoprid, or a roller, often called the African dung beetle.
They do not waste time in finding fresh droppings as they prefer
to work with soft and delicious dung. Which is almost exclusively from herbivores.
There is plenty of nutrient value remaining in the dung for eating, and for their larvae.
The male will collect and roll the dung, forming a movable ball that will be pushed
with the back feet as the front legs are armed with serrations to grip the ground for stability.
When the ball is of a suitable size, the male releases a pheromone attracting a female.
She will cling to the ball for dear life as the male continues to roll in search of soft soil.-
When appropriate soil is located, the pair use their
shovel-shaped heads to dig away beneath the ball, slowly burying it.
The female lays her eggs in the dung ball, referred to at this stage as the brood ball,
and the larvae are left to develop using the dung as sustenance during the metamorphic process.
They will then go back to the original pile of dung to roll another ball and
then roll it back to the same hole, placing it on top of the first ball.
In some cases they may place three balls on top of each other, kind of like a sleeve of tennis balls,
before closing the top of the hole and then leaving the larvae to hatch, feed,
and change into their adult form. What is so interesting about this
is that although the first ball in the hole was the first laid egg, it is the
last ball in that has the first emergence. Then the second ball, and lastly the first ball.
This prevents unwanted traffic on the way up to the surface.
Dung beetles are vitally important to the environment as they clean up the majority of dung.
During the summer season, when they disappear for their winter sleep,
termites take over the job of cleaning up.
It is well known that many species of birds and insects use sunlight to navigate, but in 2003
a group of researchers discovered a species using polarisation of moonlight to navigate.
That very clever creature is... you guessed it the African dung beetle!
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