Darrell the Stoical Dung Beetle--Part 1

While flying over the fields and meadows one morning, Darrell’s keen nose detected a gorgeous pile of cow poop. This was his lucky day! The poop was perfectly aged for balling—not too wet and mushy, nor too dry and crumbly. He flew down and dove in. He rolled himself a beautiful ball of poop and then commenced to trundle it home. He knew that he had a lengthy trip, with many obstacles to negotiate, before he could bury it and feast contentedly for the next several months, but he was up for the effort. His prize was worth the struggle.

Darrell industrially planted his two front legs on the ground, lowered his head, raised his back four legs against the turd ball, and began to push. Like many of his hard-working dung beetle cohorts, Darrell had the strength and determination to push a ball nearly three times his size and ten times his weight. Grunting, he got the ball rolling homeward. Darrell knew that many barriers might try to stymie him: tree roots, fallen branches, ruts, and clumps of weeds. Since he was pushing backwards, he was unable to see them coming, so it was a case of whether or not fortune continued to smile upon him. Would his luck hold out?           

A small dung beetle with a big ball of shit is at the mercy of unseen terrain. If he got stuck, Herculean effort may be required to keep going. Would he prevail? Would he be thwarted? He still remembered the time he tried to cross a fairway on the golf course and dropped his dung ball into a deep divot. He was almost home at the time, but had to give up and return to the poop pile and fashion a second dung ball, which he finally succeeded in rolling home. Like a kid trying to make an outsized snowman, Darrell forged bravely on.

Soon he bumped up against a small twig and his ball wouldn’t budge. Unable to see what the impediment was, Darrell dropped to the ground and circumnavigated his treasured globe. Spotting the twig wedged under the ball, he yanked it out, resumed his Atlas position at the front, and rolled on.

Some would regard Darrell as overly stupid, to take on such a task. If a bird or chipmunk spotted him, he’d probably get laughed at, tackling such an outlandish ambition—especially for such a disgusting object. But tenacious and resolute, Darrell knows that he can succeed. He’s done it before. He’s on a roll!

Unexpectedly, Doug the Dung Beetle suddenly flies down, lands next to Darrell and asks if he needs help. “Looks like you’ve got a mighty big ball there, brother. I could lend a foot.” Darrell is suspicious. He knows that Doug is a sneaky dude, and doesn’t trust him any farther than he could throw his turd ball. Trying to discourage the intruder, he says, “Thanks, but I’m doing OK. I’m sure I can manage.” He pushes on.

More on Darrell’s trials next time…

Fabre's Insects

Jean Henri Fabre was a French entomologist and author who graced our little planet with his copious observations of the insect world. He lived from 1823 to 1915. Charles Darwin paid tribute to Fabre, calling him an “inimitable observer.” And that’s exactly what Fabre was—an incomparable insect eyewitness, as well as a commentator; not an opinionated theorist and not an academic who sits in his book-lined office and claims esoteric postulates about the workings of the world.

Fabre spent many years on his hands and knees, his nose close to the ground, observing countless details of the lives of insects. He had an enormous respect for the “lowly” bugs: their sheer numbers, their intricate habits, and their crucial role in the ecological balance of life on Earth. While others pronounced their often conceited and off-base ideas about insects, Fabre meticulously and objectively watched. And he watched.

But he did more than just watch and become familiar with what the little critters were doing; he conducted experiments. Watching may tell us what is happening, but the clever experiments that Fabre conceived of revealed the meaning behind their actions. Otherwise, we too easily fall prey to our preconceived and anthropomorphic thoughts. As he wrote: without experimentation, we tend to observe an insect and draw conclusions, based not “upon the primary motives of its activities, but our own opinions, which always yield a reply in favor of our cherished notions.”

So he watched and he watched; he asked good questions, and he conducted experiments, a process “which alone is able to some extent to fathom the obscure problem of animal intelligence.” Intelligence? Yes… he saw that the simplest insects display an acumen that is to be admired. His sense of humility enabled him to pursue and perceive some amazing facts about the insect world. He was able to see beauty in what most people feel is repugnant. His essays on the dung beetle, for example, provide a prime example of his ability to perceive the fascination and value of this lowly bug.

An illustration of his humility is shown by a letter he wrote to a friend, in which he said, “Because I have shifted a few grains of sand upon the shore, am I in a position to understand the abysmal depths of the ocean? Life has unfathomable secrets. Human knowledge will be eroded from the world’s archives before we possess the last word that a gnat has to say to us.” I love that last phrase… the end of our knowledge will never come.

The dung beetle is a curious little critter—engaging in behavior that humans consider disgusting: finding piles of poop, carving out and forming a round ball that is some 10 times the weight of the beetle, and then patiently rolling the turd sphere to a safe location, where it can be buried, to serve as either a cache of food or as a brooding chamber for its offspring. The beetle requires no other repast or liquid other than his poop ball; it’s his complete and sole diet. What’s more, he prefers the dung of herbivores, so his taste cannot be considered to be non-discriminating. Carnivore poop is not nearly as delicious, apparently.

The dung beetle offers a valuable service to the environment, by removing a breeding ground for flies and other germ-spreading bugs. This helps improve the hygiene of a herd of cattle, as well as provides fertilizer for plants, after he entombs the cow dung, but doesn’t completely consume it.

The following biographical sketch of the travails of a dung beetle was inspired—maybe even incited—by Fabre’s detailed and fascinating descriptions of the habits of these little critters.

Next time: the adventures of Darrell the Dung Beetle