Every day, millions of herbivores – including the ungulates that we are studying in the Masai Steppe Ecosystem – eat tons of grass, excreting vast amounts of seed-filled dung. Dung beetles disperse, feast upon, and live within these droppings, which provide a nutrient-rich food source for the beetles’ larvae. This may seem a lowly, rather unenviable lifestyle, but entomologists now understand that the savannah and many of its plants and animals completely depend upon the ecosystem services provided by dung beetles.
More than 100 species of dung beetle have been recorded in Serengeti National Park alone, with different strategies in how they utilize the dung. “Roller” beetles create a ball of dung up to 40 times their body weight and can transport it up to 70 meters away, thus spreading nutrients far and wide. “Tunneller” beetles bury their balls of dung, helping the plant seeds within to germinate. Without these beetles, the ground would quickly be covered in a thick layer of dung, smothering the grasses that ungulates depend on for food.
Even the lowliest members of an ecosystem play critical roles in the intricate web of life.” from the
Wild Nature Institute
Getting back to my youth on the farm. After we had milked the cows and before the sun went down, I would linger near the barn and watch the barn swallows. Groups of them would dive and plunge, fly high and then desend, sometimes all together and then in groups. They were called barn swallows because they built nests in the barn. Later, as the darkness arrived, I watched bats, one by one, fly from their nesting place.
I think of the declining bird species. Many of them lived on insects. The insects lived on plant material and the minerals that they accumulated would then be gobbbled up by flying birds and then as the birds vlew far and wide, sometime thousands of miles, they exerted their waste (bat dung is some of the best fertilizer in the world) and spread minerals across the land. All a part of the process of life on our planet.
Along with the declining insects, we are also losing frogs, salamanders, and caecilians:
“This is particularly disturbing because amphibians — which include frogs, salamanders, and caecilians (they look like worms crossed with snakes) — have been around for hundreds of millions of years.
“During the great extinctions of the dinosaurs in the Pleistocene, amphibians made it through with no appreciable effect,” Mendelson says. “So they’re not the most delicate creatures in the world. But the world has gotten so bad now that even the amphibians can’t tolerate it.”...The planet is at the start of a sixth mass extinction in its history, with huge losses already reported in larger animals that are easier to study. But insects are by far the most varied and abundant animals, outweighing humanity by 17 times. They are “essential” for the proper functioning of all ecosystems, the researchers say, as food for other creatures, pollinators and recyclers of nutrients...One of the biggest impacts of insect loss is on the many birds, reptiles, amphibians and fish that eat insects. “If this food source is taken away, all these animals starve to death,” www.theguardian.com/…
We tend to think that it is the farmers who are spraying toxic chemicals and responsible for the death of so many animals. But as I drove by the beautiful yards that stretched for miles and then returned to my city abode and saw the golf courses, all within minutes from me and then across, up and down and over, street after street with weed free lawns and free from patches of flowers for insects to live in…
I am 80 years old and have been involved in farm education, actual farming, associated with Amish families and their production and in my retirement, only wanted to have a nice little garden. Beginning a little over four years ago, I started losing plants because of drift from dandelion spaying. I have gone from tomato plants that formed an arbor above my head to plants that kept getting smaller and smaller. This year, as of Sept the first, I have only had one tomato grow to full size. This is a far cry from when I furnished the neighbors with tomatoes. In four years, I have only had one turnip crop that even germinated. The same goes with beet, chard and I have had two pea crops that the leaves withered off of. I could go on and on. This will be my last attempt because I am no longer able to haul in trailer loads of new compost and hundreds of bags to spread. You can read about how this started on a previous story Here
Although I don’t agree with it, I respect my neighbors right to have their yard under current law. What I don’t understand is why I don’t have the same right to have a garden?
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