Why should we care about dung beetles?
Dung beetles provide valuable ecological and economic services. The net value of dung beetles is estimated at ~$2 billion per year for the agriculture and cattle industries worldwide. As nutrient recyclers, dung beetles aid in dung decomposition while integrating the natural fertilizer in the soil.
True flies, scientifically known as Diptera (Greek for two-winged), are a group of insects that are typically associated, in the public mind, with filth and disease. This is because most people only interact with them in their kitchens or in agricultural or medical settings as pests or as carriers of disease. And while these generalisations have some truth to them, the vast majority of flies are not detrimental to human health or food production, but rather form an integral part of numerous ecosystems worldwide (Triplehorn & Johnson 2005).
While most people do their utmost to avoid flies, we as entomologists, and particularly specialists called dipterists, actively seek them out as part of our jobs. As fly taxonomists, it is our passion to collect, classify, and if we find new species, describe them.
Most of us are familiar with termite nests. Just imagine driving along the roads in the Free State, seeing hundreds of termite nests in the fields next to the road. In these nests are not only termites, but also mites. Some mites are free-living in the nests, sometimes catching a ride on termites to carry them around in the nest.
Pre-Devonian in origin, the Pseudoscorpiones are one of the oldest extant lineages and over the past 392 Ma have diverged into more than 3400 known species in 26 families. Most are less than five millimetres in length, though they range from less than one millimetre in some Chthoniidae to just over ten millimetres in females of Garypus titanius Beier, 1961. They superficially resemble true scorpions, but lack the elongated tail and sting.