What is doing this?

[HashRouge]

Fairly frequently, I find fresh holes in the earth under horse poo when I am poo picking. They are fairly small, maybe 1-2 cm in diameter, and often there is excavated dirt under the horse poo as well. Any idea what is causing this? Would it be a dung beetle or something similar?

 

[Barton Bounty]

Fairly frequently, I find fresh holes in the earth under horse poo when I am poo picking. They are fairly small, maybe 1-2 cm in diameter, and often there is excavated dirt under the horse poo as well. Any idea what is causing this? Would it be a dung beetle or something similar?

Worms and beetles

 

[cauda equina]

It sounds like scarab beetles, the second one down
https://www.ukbeetles.co.uk/dung

I do all my poo picking by hand with gloves and often find them

 

[Peglo]

I often find pretty, shiny, blue beetles in our dung and find holes under the dung too. I assume the blue beetles come up through the holes.
I'm no sure what kind of beetles they are but they seem harmless.

 

[Dave's Mam]

Dung beetles.

 

[Lois Lame]

Yes, dung beetles, and they are great.

 

[Daughter of the Moor]

Dung beetles. When I am poo picking I always leave a little bit to cover the holes.

 

[Mrs B]

Dung beetles. When I am poo picking I always leave a little bit to cover the holes.

Me too! ?
Fab little creatures ...

 

[HappyHollyDays]

I thought they were worm holes but I’m really excited if they are dung beetles because it’s the first time I’ve seen them in any of the fields here. I have tried to look after my track and paddock this year and it’s nice to know I’m on the right path.

 

[Polos Mum]

Lovely beetles - they say great things about the health of your soil. My best find was five holes per horse poo! which you can see below.

Mine are iridescent blue underneath and are about the size of a thumb nail.

 

[Polos Mum]

They play dead if you disturb them - but they won't be. I cover them back up - happy to leave a little poo for them.

 

[Goldenstar]

Dung beetles my best friends .

 

[mini-eventer]

I always leave them a bit of poo too

 

[HashRouge]

I don't tend to find any beetles, so hopefully they're safely in their holes and I haven't been scooping them up! That said, hopefully they'd quite enjoy themselves on my poo pile!

 

[Lucky Snowball]

They play dead if you disturb them - but they won't be. I cover them back up - happy to leave a little poo for them.

I often wondered why they were all dead ??

 

[turkana]

I leave some poo for them as well, I think they're quite cute, thought I was the only daft person doing it

 

[Tarragon]

I have often wondered whether they search for a pile of poo, then build their hole, and if that is the case, how far do they travel, or whether they wait for poo to land on top of their hole!

 

[Landcruiser]

Some of the holes I find under my poo (my horses' poo I hasten to add) are massive, about 2 cm across. Other poo piles have lots of small holes. I often find dozens of the small beetles in my barrow while poo picking but I've never seen what I assume is the large maxi version. Encouragingly, since we have started letting our lawn grow into a meadow through the last few summers, we now have them there too - they take the dogs' poo down into the soil within a couple of days sometimes, if we are lax on removing it ourselves

 

[Polos Mum]

I have often wondered whether they search for a pile of poo, then build their hole, and if that is the case, how far do they travel, or whether they wait for poo to land on top of their hole!

They fly quite long distances - there are 50 species in the UK all with different ranges of flight. I have had the odd large one fly into the barn - they make a big noise !!

They like a fresh poo, fly to it and then burrow underneath - the hole is them pulling the poo down into the soil to lay eggs in / eat.

They aerate, fertilise and do all sorts of good things to encourage other soil dwellers

 

[planete]

I have found clusters of their eggs, small white spheres, under the poo as well. Apparently it is best to then leave the dropping alone for the eggs.

 

[Nasicus]

Here's some photos of a particularly pretty one I found whilst poo picking a few months ago (click for bigger image)