Cleanup Crew Some beetles eat things that most other animals wouldn’t. T ey’re scavengers. T ese beetles find dead or dying animals. T en they gobble them up. Kavanaugh knows where to find


a beetle like this. He stops beside a stream in the forest. T ere, he sees a whirligig beetle in the water. It’s zipping around. It’s looking for insects that have


fallen in the water. Before long, it finds a struggling insect. T en the whirligig zooms in to attack.


This sexton beetle searches for a dead mouse to bury.


Still Hungry? A sexton beetle is a scavenger, too. It eats dead birds. It also eats mice and other small rodents. Before eating, this beetle buries its food. If a team of beetles finds a dead


mouse, the beetles work together. T ey squeeze under the mouse. T ey liſt it onto their backs. T ey move it to a patch of soſt dirt. T en they bury it. Once the mouse is buried, a female


beetle comes along. She digs in the ground to lay her eggs near the mouse. When her larvae hatch, they eat the mouse.


8 NATIONAL GEOGRAPHIC EXPLORER


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