Art gift 100! This one is going to a contributor to my Friends of the Earth fundraiser. (Every donation of $5 or more gets a small surprise piece of original bug art in the mail. Not too late to get one.) This is a male goliath beetle. It’s a hero of the environment and the largest beetle in the world, up to 4.3 inches long. Its short life— just a few months—begins as an egg buried in the soil. It goes through three metamorphoses before reaching maturity. As an adult, it likes the sweet life, eats sweet food—tree sap and rotting fruit—though in earlier life it requires more protein and will also eat rotting plant and animal matter, including dung. It plays an important role in the tropical African forest ecosystem, cleaning up garbage and recycling nutrients back into soil. It uses its claws to climb trees, but can also fly with its double set of wings (inner and outer). The goliath beetle is very strong. It can carry loads up to 850 times its own weight. When I grow up, I want to be just like the goliath beetle. (Except for the part about eating dung.) . Goliath beetle, ink on paper, 4.5 x 6.5” - I’m drawing bugs to draw attention to the devastating loss of insect life on earth due to climate change, deforestation, and industrial agriculture. These problems are large scale and require organized efforts to fix, not just individual action. But the good news is, we can join up and support organizations doing the work. Every little bit counts. . . . #insect #insects #insectart #goliathbeetle #beetle #drawing #insectdrawing #markerart #inspiredbynature #recycler #africanwildlife #sweetlife #artforchange #drawingattention #drawingbugs #bug #bugs #anthropocene #massextinction #artivism #artivist #artdaily #artoftheday #drawingoftheday #worksonpaper #wildlife #ecoart #ecoarte #insects_of_our_world #insectlovers https://www.instagram.com/p/CMj_PlNn58D/?igshid=1pzd2m1ni7okt
