Producers, especially regenerative ranchers, become animated when they start finding dung beetles in their cow pies (dung pats). Those little dung beetles are part of a whole community of critters working in a single cow dung pat to recycle nutrients – and water – back into the soil to grow healthy grasses.
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Dung beetles – openers of the cow pie
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Ryan Schmid, research scientist for the Ecdysis Foundation at the Blue Dasher Farm, near Estelline, S.D., recently completed a two-year study of dung pat samples taken from 40 different pastures from ranches ranging from Bismarck to southeastern North Dakota to Brookings, S.D.
Ryan Schmid, research scientist for the Ecdysis Foundation at the Blue Dasher Farm, near Estelline, S.D., digs for a dung pat sample.
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