124 



THE AMERICAN ENTOMOLOGIST. 



such liquid matter, if they take anj- food n( all : 

 while most of their larvfB feed upon the tis-snes 

 of various plants, a few upon woolen rlolhes, a 

 a few upon furs, and a few even upon fatty 

 substances. Yet nobody ever found one of these 

 IJutterfllcs 01- JEoths depositino- its eggs upon 

 the nectary of flowers, where the honey which 

 they themselves love so dearly is to he found; 

 but. on the contrary, they each of them uni- 

 formly lay (heir eg-gs upon that particular sub- 

 stance which they are instinctively aware that 

 their future larva? will relish, but for which they 

 themselves have no taste whatever. 



Certain dung--foeding- beetles— for c\aiii|ili', a 

 species {Llgyrus rcUctuH, Say), vilii-li i- (i!ien 

 mistaken both in the larva and in the pcifect 

 state for the common May-bug or Slay-beetle 

 {Larhnoslerna querdna, Kuoch)— follow the 

 same wondej-ful plan which has been detailed 

 above; that is, they deposit their eggs In any 

 mass of dung thai they can lind. lint far more 

 commonly among those beetle^, the Inrv.c of 

 >vhich feed upon dung, we find an improvement 

 upon the usual system. Instead of de]jo>iling 

 their eggs in the dung, wherever it lies, they 

 bore deep holes in the ground underneath it, 

 and carry down little pellets of it into these 

 holes, in which pellets they lay tlieir eggs; thus 

 securing the savory morsels from the various 

 other insects that adopt the more i)riniilive cus- 

 tom referred to above. On precisely the same 

 Ijrinciple the Burying-bectles (JS^eci'opIionis) 

 lay their eggs in small pieces of carrion, such 

 as dead rats, dead birds, &c., having previously 

 buried the carrion completely underground to 

 prevent Meat-flies from "fly-blowing" it, and 

 having by this means eflTectnally monopolized 

 it for their future oftspring. On one particular 

 occasion, having deposited a full-grown dead 

 rat upon newly-moved earth in a particular 

 spot, as a trap for these Burying-bectles, we 

 found thai in twelve hours' time the carcass had 

 been coiiiiilclrly buried, all but the tip of the 

 tail, by a siiii;lc individual of our lai-gest and 

 handsomest species (iV. ameriramis, 01iv.),a 

 beetle which is only IJ inch long. It would 

 puzzle an Irish laborer to bury a full-grown 

 whale in the same length of time; yet propor- 

 tionally this would be a task of precisely the 

 same magnitude. 



In the case of the Burying-beetles and certain 

 Dung-beetles, we caught the first iidding of an 

 improvement upon the usual habits of insect 

 life; for these, as we have seen, bury the sub- 

 stance upon which their future families are des- 

 tined to subsist, a few inches under ground. In 

 the case of the common Tumble-dung Beetles 



((■iiiitliiin). \\f rind a >till further development 

 of useful and intelligent industry; for these, as 

 every Amiiican must have noticed, not satisfied 

 with burying the pellets of dung, destined each 

 of them to feed to maturity the laiwaof a future 

 Tumble-dung, on the spot where that dung has 

 been dropi)cd— a-, for example, is the universal 

 practice of an allied genus (Geu/ri/peii) of about 

 the same size and shape — roll them over and 

 over for .several \aid<, till they have reached a 

 snug retired spot, anil Ihcn. and not till then, pro- 

 ceed to bury them. Andior^ have been much 

 puzzled to account tor lliis extraordinary pro- 

 ceeding: but, to our mind, the reason otitis 

 obvious. 'Dwvf are a great number of rather 

 small Cannibal r; round-beet le-^(rVoY(/v/^A' family), 

 the larvse of which pi-ey upon the larv;i> of such 

 dung-feeding beetles as buiy the dung on the 

 spot where it falls, the niother-beetlo.s being di- 

 rected to the spot, so as to know exactly where 

 to lay their eggs, by the presence of the unsa- 

 vory substance itself. By removing the precious 

 pellet to a .-uitable distance and then carefully 

 burying it, the provident Tumble-dung guai'ds 

 against such a liiishap; though, even with such 

 careful forethought, she does not in all probabil- 

 itv entirelv elude the attacks of other insect 



haliits of the Tumble-dung, il may be observed 

 tliat, although we have in lUinois at least four 

 distinct species of the dung-burying genus {Gco- 

 tvypim) just now referred to as closely allied to 

 the Tumble-dung, and only one species of Tum- 

 ble-dung(Crt;(//io« kvris, Drury) knowntohave 

 the remarkable habits refer.-ed to above, * yet 

 the latter are at least 100 ti]nes as numerous in 

 individuals as the former. Why should this be 

 so? These beetles are nearly all of the same 

 size, shape and strength. They all breed in pel- 

 lets of dung buried pretty deeply in the earth 

 by the parent-beetle. The only difference in the 

 habits of the two genera is, that the first buries 

 its dung on the spot where that dung is drop- 

 ped, and its larvie are consequently more easily 

 detected by their insect foes : while, taught by a 

 wise Providence, the more careful Tumble-dung 

 removes its odorous pellets to a safe distance 

 fi-otn the dangerous spot, and thus escapes with 

 comparative immunity from the attacks of its 

 Cannibal enemies. Consequently the Tumble- 

 dungs beat their less skillful antagonists in the 

 struggle for existence, and out-breed and out- 

 number them, just as the Caucasian White man 

 out-breeds and outnumbers the uncivilized Red 



• A siugle »peuim?u of Canthon viridis, Beuuv , has lieeii 

 fipuiul near Kock Island by tile Senior EiUtor; 1>ii I tlii- lialnts 

 nC this minute species are not known. 



