Bucket of Mice

Submitted by:	Bennett Grappone
Department:	Biological Sciences
Faculty:	Sciences

This image shows a burying beetle (Nicrophorus hebes) standing on a dead mouse in one of the carrion-baited pitfall traps I use to collect beetles for my research. These beetles bury small dead animals and feed them to their larvae, which is an impressive level of parental care for an insect. My research includes the small tan mites (genus Poecilochirus) that can be seen crawling on the beetle’s head and thorax in this photo. These mites ride on the beetle as a means of transportation between carcasses, and can even help their hosts by hunting down and eating fly eggs and larvae that would otherwise compete with the beetles for food. My project investigates whether the beetles show preferences for any specific type of dead animal, and whether the mites riding on the beetles are all a single species or a group of similar looking cryptic species.

Was your image created using Generative AI?
No.

How was your image created?
We placed several pitfall traps baited with dead frogs and mice in an open meadow in Elk Island National Park in early July. After a week had passed, we returned to the site to check the buckets and collect any burying beetles that had fallen in. We spotted this photogenic beetle standing on top of one of the dead mice and took a photo.

Where is the image located?
This image was taken in a patch of meadow in Elk Island National Park, near the entrance to Bison Loop Road.