Brood ball construction by the non‐brooding Coprini Sulcophanaeus carnifex and Dichotomius torulosus (Coleoptera, Scarabaeidae)

Feeding burrows made by S.carnifex and D.torulosus adults consisted of tunnels filled with sausage‐shaped masses of dung. Brood balls were made by taking fragments of dung from an adjacent feeding burrow and aggregating them into a small sphere which was gradually enlarged and then coated with soil. S.carnifex adult females showed no response to their own eggs (unlike Copris lunaris: Klemperer, H.G. (1982) Ecological Erltonzology, 7, 155–167). S.carnifex larvae made and maintained an air channel to the upper pole of the ball and they are in this respect preadapted to receive parental care. Compared with a brood mass, a brood ball was less likely to be attacked by Meptoparasitic larvae. The soil coat retarded drying of the brood ball by increasing the total mass of moisturecontaining material. Copyright © 1983, Wiley Blackwell. All rights reserved