It’s a bit hard to make out in the photo, but there the center is a larger black insect being swarmed by dozens of small light brown ones. The larger one looks like some sort of beetle. What are the smaller ones?

  • Kyrgizion@lemmy.worldEnglish
    2·
    2 months ago

    So they’re not actually beetle parasites but just use them as transportation? That’s cool!

    • Successful_Try543@feddit.deEnglish
      2·
      2 months ago

      I somehow forgot to include a sentence from the properties section:

      Some of the mites live ectoparasitically on beetles and are also phoretic here, as they utilize the transport capacity of their host.

      I think this implies they also drink the ‘blood’ of the beetle while being transported to another place.

      • Kethal@lemmy.worldOPEnglish
        2·
        2 months ago

        Thanks. More creepy bug stuff I didn’t know about. The beetle seemed inhibited if not incapacitated by them. It looked to me like a swarming attack, but it could have just been that there were so many that it couldn’t easily move.