Name: The dance of the dung beetle
Uploaded: 2012-12-13T16:00:50Z
Duration: 16 min 51 s
Description: A dung beetle has a brain the size of a grain of rice, and yet it shows a tremendous amount of intelligence when it comes to rolling its food source -- animal excrement -- home. How? It all comes down to a dance.

Marcus Byrne: The dance of the dung beetle

The dance of the dung beetle

A dung beetle has a brain the size of a grain of rice, and yet it shows a tremendous amount of intelligence when it comes to rolling its food source -- animal excrement -- home. How? It all comes down to a dance. 

Dung beetles, with brains no bigger than a grain of rice, display remarkable problem-solving as they roll and bury balls of animal dung across the African veld. They rely on intricate dances to orient themselves using cues from the sun and polarized light—signals invisible to humans. Thermal challenges are met with clever behaviors like climbing atop their dung balls to avoid scalding sand. These insects also use path integration to find their way home, revealing a world of unexpected intelligence in even the smallest creatures.