Among the coprophagous species of beetles, Scarabaeus sacer is typical of those that collect dung into balls.
Such a beetle rolls its ball to a suitable location, where it digs an underground chamber in which it hides the ball.
It then eats the ball itself, a process that may take several days.

When the female is ready to breed she selects especially fine-textured dung to make her breeding ball, and digs an especially deep and large chamber for it.
There she sculpts it into a pear-shape with a hollow cavity in the narrow part.
In that cavity she lays a single large egg.
She then seals the cavity and departs to repeat the process elsewhere.
Typically a successful female Scarabaeus sacer will produce only about half a dozen young in her life.
The larva feeds on the ball of dung after the egg hatches.

Scarabaeus sacer serves as the host for the phoretic mite Macrocheles saceri.
Among the coprophagous species of beetles, Scarabaeus sacer is typical of those that collect dung into balls. Such a beetle rolls its ball to a suitable location, where it digs an underground chamber in which it hides the ball. It then eats the ball itself, a process that may take several days.
When the female is ready to breed she selects especially fine-textured dung to make her breeding ball, and digs an especially deep and large chamber for it. There she sculpts it into a pear-shape with a hollow cavity in the narrow part. In that cavity she lays a single large egg. She then seals the cavity and departs to repeat the process elsewhere. Typically a successful female Scarabaeus sacer will produce only about half a dozen young in her life. The larva feeds on the ball of dung after the egg hatches.
Scarabaeus sacer serves as the host for the phoretic mite Macrocheles saceri.
Scarabaeus sacer