burying beetle adult

American Burying Beetle

(Nicrophorus americanus)

New words in this article: scavenger - an animal that eats the bodies of dead animals nocturnal - active at night saliva - liquid that comes from the mouth which helps to break down food larvae - newly hatched insects regurgitated - partially digested (food) and vomited metamorphose - change Read about people who study insects: Andrea Kozol: American Burying Beetles Thomas Eisner: Chemical Ecology of Insects

Not many people think of insects as endangered species, but humans have had as great an impact on them as any other kind of animal. The American burying beetle (Nicrophorus americanus) is one bug that has almost gone extinct. You can recognize it by the orange markings on its shiny black body. It grows to be about 3 cm long when it is an adult, which is bigger than many other beetles.

burying beetle larvae The American burying beetle is a scavenger, and it helps clean up the environment by eating the dead bodies of animals. The beetles are nocturnal, and they find their food by smell. When a male and a female burying beetle find a dead animal, they bury it by digging a hole beneath the body and then covering it with dirt. They do this to keep the carcass as food for their babies. They pull off all the fur or feathers, and roll the body into a tight ball. Then, the body is covered with sticky saliva that helps to keep it from rotting and makes it easier for the babies to eat. The female beetle lays up to 30 eggs in a tunnel near the carcass. When the eggs hatch into larvae, both the mother and the father stay to feed them with regurgitated food and to protect them from other beetles. This care is unusual since most insects leave their babies to live on their own. The larvae then burrow into the soil until they metamorphose into adults.

Once, the American burying beetle was found in all of the United States east of the Rocky Mountains. Now, they are only found in Oklahoma and on Block Island off the coast of Rhode Island. No one knows exactly why they began to disappear, but people suspect habitat destruction and the loss of food sources. The Passenger Pigeon may have been a major food source for the beetle. However, once the pigeon was hunted to extinction by humans, the beetles may not have been able to find enough food to survive.

Today, the Roger Williams Zoo in Rhode Island is breeding the beetles in captivity. So far, they have raised six batches of baby beetles, and a new colony has successfully been established on Nantucket Island off the coast of Massachusetts.