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Cleanup crews
Though their work may not be pretty, scavengers play an important role in the natural world, recycling dung, carrion and decaying vegetable matter. Throughout the Upper Delaware region, such creatures do their part to transform waste into useful nutrients. From the highly visible turkey vulture feasting on road kill, to the unseen bacteria within, our experiences in nature are ultimately improved by the transformative efforts of scavengers.
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| TRR photo by Sandy Long | |
| Tumblebugs subsist on the dung of large mammals, which they form into a ball before rolling it, backwards, for some distance. The ball is rolled into a vertical tunnel that they have excavated. Before covering the ball with earth, a single egg is deposited on it. The dull black industrious insects are one of approximately 1,300 North American species of scarab beetles. This one was hard at work moving a carefully crafted ball of dung across a path at the Minisink Battleground in Minisink Ford, NY.
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| TRR photo by Sandy Long | |
| Tiger swallowtails most often feed on the nectar from a wide variety of flowers, though they sometimes play a role as scavengers, drawing nourishment from carrion or manure. The swallowtails depicted here were jockeying for access to the carcass of a small deer that lay along the shoreline at the confluence of the Delaware River and Ten Mile River in New York. The tiger swallowtail is one of the most common butterflies in the East and can be spotted in forest glades, gardens, orchards, roadways, streams and rivers.
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