Dung Beetle

Dung beetles are a large group of beetles found on every continent except Antarctica, unified by a diet that consists wholly or mainly of animal feces, which they locate with a highly developed sense of smell and process with remarkable efficiency, providing a critical ecological service by recycling nutrients, aerating soil and suppressing pest flies and parasites. They are broadly divided by behavior into rollers, which shape dung into a ball and roll it away to bury for feeding or as a brood chamber, tunnelers, which bury dung directly beneath or near the dung pile, and dwellers, which live and breed within the dung itself. The rolling species are especially notable for their navigational ability, with research showing some use the pattern of polarized light from the Milky Way to keep their dung ball rolling in a straight line at night. Male dung beetles of several species bear prominent horns used in combat over mates and burrows, and the group as a whole holds the record for the strongest animal relative to body weight, with some species able to pull well over a thousand times their own body mass. Dung beetles were also revered in ancient Egypt, where the scarab, a type of dung beetle, was associated with the sun god and became a widespread religious and artistic symbol.