Chapter 19 Insects of Sisis

I hope you haven't gotten tired of hearing the weird thing about scavenger beetles doing balls.I have already told you about the sacred beetle and the Spanish rhinoceros, now I want to tell you about some other species of this animal.In the world of insects, we have met many exemplary mothers, now just for fun, let's pay attention to a good father! Good fathers are rare, except among the higher animals.Birds are superior in this respect, and man is best at fulfilling this duty.Among the lower animals the father is indifferent to family affairs.Few insects are exceptions to this rule.This kind of ruthlessness is disgusting in the world of advanced animals, and their young animals do not need long-term care.And that's forgivable for the insect father.For given a suitable site, newborn insects can grow quite healthily, and will probably find food without assistance.For example, for the safety of the race, the pink butterfly only needs to lay its eggs on vegetable leaves, so what is the use of the father's sense of responsibility?The mother has an instinct to use plants and does not need help.When laying eggs, it does not need the protection of the father.

Many insects follow a simple parenting method.That is, they first need to find a dining room as the home of the larvae after they hatch, or find a place first so that the larvae can find suitable food by themselves and eat it after birth.In this case, they do not need a father, so the father usually dies without giving the offspring the slightest help in the work of growth. Yet things don't always work out in this primitive way.Some races prepare a dowry for their families for their future board and lodging.Bees and wasps are especially good at making little nests, such as sacks, vials, etc., and filling them with honey, and they are also very good at making earthen cavities in which game is stored, and food for grubs.

This great work of building nests and gathering food, which takes its whole life, is done by the mother alone.The work kills its time, consumes its life.The father, basking in the sunlight, stands lazily outside his workplace, just watching his industrious mate go about the hard work. Why doesn't it help a bit?In fact it never helped.Why doesn't it follow the example of the Swallows and their couples, they all bring some grass and some soil to their nests, and they also bring some worms to the chicks.And the male insects didn't do that at all.Perhaps its excuse is too weak to justify.This is a boring argument.For to cut a piece of a leaf, to pluck some cotton from a plant, to gather a bit of cement from the earth, is all that its power can do.It is quite capable of helping the females as a worker, and it is well adapted to gather some materials and build them up by more intelligent females.The real reason it doesn't do it is simply because it doesn't want to do it.

It surprises men that most of the working insects do not know the responsibilities of fatherhood.Everyone works hard for the needs of the larva to develop the highest talents, but these fathers are still as dull as butterflies, and it is very little effort for the family.Every time we cannot answer the following question: Why does this insect have this particular instinct, but other insects do not? We are amazed and incomprehensible when we see this noble quality in the scavenger-beetle and not in the honey-gathering insects. There are many species of scavenger-beetles adept at taking up the burden of housekeeping, and know the value of the two working together. .For example, the dung beetle couple, they jointly prepare grub food, and the father helps his partner with a strong crushing work when making sausage-like food.

They are the best examples of the habit of forming a family to work together, and are the rarest exceptions to the general case of selfishness. In this matter, after my long study, I can add to this example three other examples, all of which are facts of the cooperation of the scavenger-beetles. One of the three was Sisyphus, the smallest and most industrious of the pill-rollers.It's the liveliest and most responsive of them all, and doesn't mind toppling and somersaulting on treacherous roads where it stubbornly climbs up only to fall back down again.It is because of those crazy gymnastics that people gave it a name, Sisyphus.

I think you should know that it takes a lot of hard work for a poor man to become famous.It was forced to roll a big stone up a high mountain, and every time it managed to reach the top of the mountain, the stone slipped down again and rolled to the foot of the mountain.I love this myth, it's the history of many of us, myself for over fifty years slogging up steep hills, wasting my energies in the struggle to safely get our daily bread inside.As soon as the bread slipped, it rolled down and fell into the abyss, where it was difficult to stabilize. The Sisyphus whom I am speaking of now is unaware of this difficulty, and rolls food without hesitation on the steep slopes, sometimes feeding himself and sometimes his offspring.In our parts it is rare, and I have no place to get so many observations to study without the assistant we have mentioned several times before.

My youngest son, Paul, is seven years old.He was my eager insect-hunting companion, and knew better than any boy his age the secrets of cicadas, locusts, crickets, and especially the scavenger beetle.His sharp eyes could tell from twenty paces away which mounds of earth were beetle nests and which were not.His sensitive ear could pick up the faint singing of the katydids, which I could not at all do.He helped me see and listen, and I gave him my opinions in exchange, and he was very attentive to my opinions. Little Paul had his own worm cage, in which the holy beetle made its nest.His own garden, about the size of a handkerchief, allowed him to grow some beans in it, but he often dug them up to see if the rootlets had grown a little.In his woodland, there are four young live oak trees, only as high as the palm of your hand, with live live oak trees attached to them, providing them with nourishment.This is an excellent rest from studying insects, and it will not hinder the progress of insect research.

When May was approaching, Paul and I got up very early one day, because it was so early, we didn't even have breakfast when we went out, and we searched in the pastures at the foot of the mountain, where the sheep had passed.Here we found Sisyphus, and Paul searched very zealously, and we soon had quite a few pairs, which was quite a success. All they need to settle down is a wire enclosure, a bed of sand, and a supply of food—for which we too have become scavengers.These animals are tiny, no bigger than a cherry pit.The shape is also very strange!It has a short, fat body with a pointed rear, and long legs that spread out like those of a spider.The hind feet are longer and curved, and are most useful for digging and hitting small balls.

Soon it was time to start a family.Fathers and mothers are equally zealous at rolling, moving, and storing food, all for their children.They use the knives on their front feet to randomly cut small pieces from the food.The couple worked together, patted and squeezed again and again, and made a ball the size of a pea. As in the sacred beetle's workshop, they make the ball into the correct circle, and they don't need mechanical force to roll the ball.The material is rounded before it is moved, or even picked up.Now we have a circularist again, skilled in the best form of making and preserving food—the circular shape.

The ball was soon made.Now it has to be rolled vigorously so that it has a hard shell which protects the soft substance inside so that it does not become too dry.We can recognize the mother who is fully armed in the front from the larger figure.It puts its long hind feet on the ground, puts its front feet on the ball, pulls the ball toward itself, and walks backwards.The father is in the opposite position, with his head down, pushing from behind. This is the same method as the holy beetle when the two work together, but the purpose is different. The Sisyphus couple is carrying food for the grub, while the big pear roller (that is, the holy beetle) prepares food for itself to munch on underground.

The pair walked on the ground, they had no fixed goal, they just kept going, regardless of the obstacles in the middle of the road.Going backwards in this way, obstacles are inevitable, but even if they see them, they will not go around them.It even made a stubborn attempt to climb over my wire cage.It's a time-consuming and impossible job, with the mother's hind foot grabbing the barbed wire and pulling the ball toward her, then wrapping her forefoot around it, holding the ball in the air.The father felt that there was nothing to push, so he hugged the ball, leaned on it, and put his body weight on the ball without any effort.It is too difficult to maintain this kind of effort.So the ball and the insect riding on it rolled into a ball and fell to the ground.The mother looked down in amazement from above, and soon came down, fixed the ball, and repeated the impossible attempt.After repeated falls, he gave up climbing the barbed wire fence. Even when transporting on flat ground, it is not completely without difficulties.Roughly every minute there was a raised pile of rocks, and the cargo tipped over.The insect that was struggling to push also fell over, lying on its back and kicking its feet.But it's just a small thing, a very small thing.Sisyphus is often overturned, it does not care.One might even think it likes it that way.But anyway, the ball is hardened and quite solid.Falls, bumps, etc. are all part of the program sheet.This crazy jump often goes on for hours! At last the mother thought the work was done, and ran nearby to find a suitable place to store the balls.The father stayed behind and squatted on top of the object.If his mate is gone for too long, he amuses himself by nimbly rubbing the ball with his upraised hind foot, disposing of his precious little ball as an actor disposes of his.It uses its deformed legs to test whether the ball is complete.No matter who looks at that kind of exaltation, no one will doubt that it is living a contented life-the father will guarantee the contentment of the future happiness of its children. It seemed to say, "I made this ball to make bread for my sons!" It held up that ball high up for everyone to see, this is the fruit of its work.At this time, the mother had found the burial place, and the first small part of the work had been done, and the next shallow cave was already started.Can push the ball into a shallow hole.The father who guarded did not leave for a moment, and the mother dug the earth with her feet and head.Before long, the crypt was big enough to hold the ball.He was always resolute in keeping the ball close to him, and he must have felt it necessary to shake it back and forth, side to side, before the hole was made, to keep the parasites away.If it is placed by the side of the cave until the home is completed, it is afraid that something unfortunate will happen.Because there are many mosquitoes and other animals that will come to grab you unexpectedly, you must be extra careful. So the ball is already half placed in the unfinished soil hole.The mother is at the bottom, holding the ball with her feet and pulling it down, and the father is on the top, lowering it gently, and paying attention to whether the falling soil will block the hole. Everything is going smoothly.The excavation went on, and the balls continued to be lowered, very carefully, one worm pulling down, the other managing the speed of the fall, and clearing away those things that hindered the work.After one more effort, both the ball and the miner went underground.What we have to do in the future is to do what we have done before, and we have to wait another half day or several hours. If we wait carefully, we can see the father alone on the ground again, crouching in the sand near the burrow.The mother often does not show up until the next day in order to fulfill her responsibilities that her mate cannot help her.Finally it came out too, and my father left the place where it dozed off and walked with it.The reunited couple returned to the places where they had found food, rested, and gathered materials again.So the two of them went back to work, modeling, transporting and storing the balls together. I admire this perseverance very much.I dare not, however, declare openly that this is the established habit of the beetle.No doubt many beetles are frivolous and without perseverance.But never mind, what I have seen, about Sisyphus's loving habits of the family, has made me value them. It's time for us to check out the Earth Nest.It wasn't very deep, and I saw a small gap in the wall, just wide enough for the mother to turn around the ball.The dormitory was small, which told us that my father couldn't stay there for long.When the studio is ready, it must run out and ask the female sculptor to continue the work. There is only one ball stored in the cellar, a masterpiece of art.Same shape as the holy beetle's pear, though much smaller.Because of its small size, the smooth and round surface of the ball is even more astonishing. At its widest point, the diameter is only one-half to three-quarters of an inch. There is another observation of Sisyphus.There were six pairs under my wire cage, and they made fifty-seven pears, each with an egg in the center—an average of more than nine grubs per pair.Holy beetles are far less than this number.What causes it to produce so many offspring?I think there is only one reason, that is, father and mother work together, the burden of a family is not enough for one person to handle, and it is not too heavy for the two to share.