#dermestids

Uhh my colony! Quick info! Demestids are nature’s cleaning crew for dead animal matter. Usually when you think of decomposition you think of maggots, which are fly larvae. They’re fine with rotting or unhealthy flesh, and will sometimes infest living creatures with open wounds (fly strike.) Generally, they’re gross. They smell bad, they look bad, and they Sound bad. Have you ever sat next to a deer being munched on by thousands of maggots? It’s like the world’s worst serving of rice krispies. They DO have a place and many vultures like them and affectionately call them “disco rice.” I’m ok with them and find them valuable members of the ecosystem, but I don’t love them.

I LOVE dermestids. They’re a cute little black beetle species with adorable larvae. They’re larvae are small, dark, and fuzzy like caterpillars. They do not like to eat rotting flesh, and will never eat anything living. Dermestids prefer fresh deads or dried deads, and tend to move in after the maggots have come through. These ones will stay with a carcass until it’s bones are clean, pupating, adulting, mating, and laying the next generation in the same critter. I had a fox whose entire insides were replaced with empty pupa shells it was really cool and artistically inspiring! It’s a really beautiful process.

My colony! It’s a wild colony that I’ve had for a couple years. I got a raccoon with dermestids in it and put it in a cage in the woods, and it’s been going ever since. I keep them fed with a steady supply of critters, removing the old ones and cleaning them up. Whenever I transfer bones from the cage to water for further maceration, I pick off and shake out as many as I can, then I dunked the skull for a second, bring it up, and scoop off everyone who was inside and now needs to abandon ship. I know I have plenty left but I don’t like killing even the smallest living things, so I rescue them.

I love them so much. When you start fostering something you get very affectionate toward it and want to keep it healthy and happy. I will often pick up critters I don’t really want just because my colony hasn’t eaten lately and I want them to do well. I have SO many dried squirrel feet for this reason.

It’s very meditative, actually. They don’t smell bad, they just smell like dead leaves or a log turned over to see the air. Their food smells musty, like old mummies if you’ve ever smelled that. Sometimes I go out there every day just to sit and watch them. I leave a spray bottle out there full of water, because hydration is important, especially in the summer. So I’ll head out there, sit down and see how everybody’s doing. Sometimes I’ll turn over the deads or rearrange them to get the part I want processed into the heart of the colony. They like eating things that are covered, so some critters are partially skinned for access and they use the hide as shelter. The fastest way to get them to process something is to put it in the center of a couple deads and lay another dead on top of it.

When everything seems good and they’re doing ok, I just sit there and mist them with water. they LOVE IT!!!! It’s so exciting and endearing to see a few bugs resting on the surface of a dried dead, and then everyone comes out to party when the water comes out. They’ll hang out around droplets and you just watch them stick their little faces in and drink up. Everybody moves around and comes out to play and you can really see how many there are. I get the whole colony hydrated to give them water and to make the dried deads palatable again. It’s a little harder for them to eat jerky than to eat soft flesh, so keeping it hydrated helps them eat faster. This is especially important for deads that have been skinned first, as they dry out quickly. Demestids can still eat the dried stuff, but it takes them longer, and some may move on to greener pastures if they feel they’ve done all they can. They’re perfectly fine with waiting for rain and they don’t need my water to survive, but I find it really helps them thrive.

My colony is completely wild, and I don’t do anything to keep them with me. They are free to come and go through the forest cage. In nature, when they’re done with a dead the adults move on to find a new one and stop laying eggs, and the skeleton is left to nature to bury and have the bones spread around by scavengers or weather. Mine have a steady supply of food, so the adults choose to stay, lay their eggs, and raise generation after generation in my back yard. I help them along and I cherish them, but I don’t own them. Some people have captive colonies where they control the humidity, temperature, food source, and health of their dermestids, but I’m just fine with my wild ones.

Earlier this year, they slowed down a LOT. I looked closely and found that a whole bunch of mites had moved in and were crowding out my dermestids and crawling all over them. This is a huge problem for domestic colonies, but for me, it’s just nature. I stopped providing deads and now my colony has moved away to find better things, and I’ll let nature clear up the mites and wait for them to realize there’s nothing more for them to eat. Once they’re gone, I just need to put out a critter and restart my colony to bring it back to its full glory.

Nature is wonderful and I’m so privileged I get to be a part of it. You can spend hours out there just watching and listening, and learning what it has to tell you. I adore my little bugs, but I’m alright with nature running its course. They’re free to come and go as they like.

I have a forest for a backyard, but you can have a wild colony if you live in the city and just know somebody with a patch of woods, prairie, or really anything wild. As long as you can set up a cage a decent bit away from houses to reduce smell, all they need is a dead thing to get started. For best results, find something dead and kind of dry looking and it probably has demestids inside it. You can’t always count on them spontaneously moving in, but it’s worth a shot! You also don’t need to mist them as they can take care of themselves.

I just love them so much. They’re so good to me and I’m good to them back. They’re adorable and sometimes finding a newly hatched or newly shed baby makes me so proud I cry.