CONTENTS
2CLEANLINESS IS NEXT TO FASTIDIOUSNESS – THE HUMAN OBSESSION WITH SEWAGE
A test for purity, or at least potability
3WASTE NOT – DUNG AS A HUMAN RESOURCE
From dung heap to hill of beans
4IT’S WORTH FIGHTING OVER – DUNG AS A VALUABLE ECOLOGICAL RESOURCE
The mad scramble for possession
First find your dung – and be quick about it
Not putting all your eggs in one basket… of dung
Major and minor leagues — mine’s bigger than yours
5DUNG COMMUNITIES – INTERACTIONS AND CONFLICTS
A model of good dung behaviour
Carving up the dung pie – three feeding and nesting strategies
Dwellers – at home in the middle of it all
Tunnellers – in a hole in the ground there lived a beetle
Rollers – divine inspiration was just about right
Thievery – possession is nine-tenths of the nest
Parasites and parasitoids – the enemies within
6THE EVOLUTION OF DUNG FEEDING – WHERE DID IT ALL BEGIN?
A beetle in the nest is worth two in the leaf litter
Once a dung beetle, always a dung beetle?
7A CLOSER LOOK – WHO LIVES IN DUNG?
The English scarab – not so sacred
Flies – the good, the bad and the bugly
8CROSS SECTION OF A DUNG PAT – A SLICE OF COPROPHAGOUS LIFE
Swimming in the stuff – soft centres
9THE AGEING PROCESS – TIME LINE OF A DUNG PAT
This place is falling to pieces
10DUNG PROBLEMS – THE END OF WORLD ORDURE AS WE KNOW IT
A fly in the bush is a pain in the eye
An impending ecological disaster of our own making
Megafauna and microfauna extinctions
11DUNG TYPES – AN IDENTIFICATION GUIDE
12DUNG INHABITANTS AND DUNG FEEDERS – A ROGUES’ GALLERY
Lepidoptera – butterflies and moths
Dictyoptera – termites and cockroaches