ROVE BEETLES



We have a rove beetle that frequents our computer and helps to debut it. He is not that big, about 1/4 inch or less, and can be mistaken for an ant, but he preys on other beetles, especially the carpet beetle larvae that can be found in a computer or in the keyboard. Those carpet beetles larvae can cause a mess when they shed their skins during molting.

Really. This rove beetle is something else. However, if you get too close to it, and it thinks you are going to kill him, he has a fierce bite as a defensive tool.

At night, rove beetles are attracted to light and will crawl on my arm during prayer. I leave them alone because they are so beneficial.

Source below is from https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rove_beetle

Rove beetles are known from every type of habitat in which beetles occur, and their diets include just about everything except the living tissues of higher plants, but now including higher plants with the discovery of the diet of Himalusa thailandensis. Most rove beetles are predators of insects and other invertebrates, living in forest leaf litter and similar decaying plant matter. They are also commonly found under stones, and around freshwater margins. Almost 400 species are known to live on ocean shores that are submerged at high tide,^[4] including the pictured rove beetle,^[5] although these are much fewer than 1% of the worldwide total of Staphylinidae. Other species have adapted to live as inquilines in ant and termite colonies, and some live in mutualistic relationships with mammals whereby they eat fleas and other parasites, benefiting the host. A few species, notably those of the genus Aleochara, are scavengers and carrion feeders, or are parasitoids of other insects, particularly of certain fly pupae.
Although rove beetles' appetites for other insects would seem to make them obvious candidates for biological control of pests, and empirically they are believed to be important controls in the wild, experiments using them have not been notably successful. Greater success is seen with those species that are parasitoids (genus Aleochara).
Rove beetles of the genus Stenus are very interesting insects. They are specialist predators of small invertebrates such as collembola. Their labium can shoot out from the head using blood pressure. The thin rod of the labium ends in a pad of bristly hairs and hooks and between these hairs are small pores that exude an adhesive glue-like substance, which sticks to prey.^[6]

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All good points.
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I recall many years ago when driving a car on a highway would always result in lots of dead bugs on the windshield. No more. You can go for hundreds of miles over farmland areas and get practically no bugs on the windows, and none in the radiator grille. 
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It can't be that they're getting too smart to fly around highways. 
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It was around the same time I read about a scientist who estimated that spiders and birds together were eating every day a total combined weight of insects equivalent to the world's population of people. But I haven't heard any such estimate lately. If insect numbers have now decreased by 76% there would have to be a comparable decrease in the consumption of them by predators. So now that I think about it, there are far fewer birds flying around lately. I haven't seen a flock of sparrows in years. I just saw one lone V-formation of Canadian geese flying south for the winter the other day, but in previous years I used to see several every day during October. 
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Some years ago I went to Europe and was amazed to find that in Germany they don't bother to keep screens on the windows of residential buildings. And I was able to open the windows to my rooms freely to let in fresh air all right. But no flies or other insects came in. Then I noticed there were no flying insects outside nor were the car windshields getting messed up by bugs. A few years later in L.A. I noticed there were suddenly a lot fewer flies around neighborhood dumpsters compared to previous years, so I asked a veterinarian about these things. His answer was that the new flea control medicines that are getting so popular here were developed in Germany about the time when I had noticed no flying insects there. He said that when a pet owner applies the requisite drops of the magic fluid on the loose fur/skin behind a dog's head or a cat's head, the stuff soaks into the skin and makes its way into the blood stream of the pet, to the effect that wherever the pet goes it becomes a kind of flea bomb. If it rolls around on the grass or in the dirt, you can be sure that no flea that lands on that spot for the next year or two will live for more than a few hours. The stuff is that powerful. He said that is probably the reason that there are not many flies around trash cans. I said that the few flies I had seen are not healthy looking, and have a drab, weak appearance, some buzzing in circles as if they're dying and others not able to fly very fast. He said that's what happens when poison goes to work, and it makes them unable to reproduce too. When larvae hatch many get sick and die right away, and the ones that do survive grow up to be abnormal or maimed somehow. 
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One can't help but wonder what becomes of the spiders that consume poisoned bugs.
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All good points.
.
I recall many years ago when driving a car on a highway would always result in lots of dead bugs on the windshield. No more. You can go for hundreds of miles over farmland areas and get practically no bugs on the windows, and none in the radiator grille.
.
It can't be that they're getting too smart to fly around highways.
.
It was around the same time I read about a scientist who estimated that spiders and birds together were eating every day a total combined weight of insects equivalent to the world's population of people. But I haven't heard any such estimate lately. If insect numbers have now decreased by 76% there would have to be a comparable decrease in the consumption of them by predators. So now that I think about it, there are far fewer birds flying around lately. I haven't seen a flock of sparrows in years. I just saw one lone V-formation of Canadian geese flying south for the winter the other day, but in previous years I used to see several every day during October.
.
Some years ago I went to Europe and was amazed to find that in Germany they don't bother to keep screens on the windows of residential buildings. And I was able to open the windows to my rooms freely to let in fresh air all right. But no flies or other insects came in. Then I noticed there were no flying insects outside nor were the car windshields getting messed up by bugs. A few years later in L.A. I noticed there were suddenly a lot fewer flies around neighborhood dumpsters compared to previous years, so I asked a veterinarian about these things. His answer was that the new flea control medicines that are getting so popular here were developed in Germany about the time when I had noticed no flying insects there. He said that when a pet owner applies the requisite drops of the magic fluid on the loose fur/skin behind a dog's head or a cat's head, the stuff soaks into the skin and makes its way into the blood stream of the pet, to the effect that wherever the pet goes it becomes a kind of flea bomb. If it rolls around on the grass or in the dirt, you can be sure that no flea that lands on that spot for the next year or two will live for more than a few hours. The stuff is that powerful. He said that is probably the reason that there are not many flies around trash cans. I said that the few flies I had seen are not healthy looking, and have a drab, weak appearance, some buzzing in circles as if they're dying and others not able to fly very fast. He said that's what happens when poison goes to work, and it makes them unable to reproduce too. When larvae hatch many get sick and die right away, and the ones that do survive grow up to be abnormal or maimed somehow.
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One can't help but wonder what becomes of the spiders that consume poisoned bugs.
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Quote from: Maria Regina on Sat Oct 21 2017 02:11:06 GMT-0400 (Eastern Daylight Time)
We have not seen many spiders either, especially the orb weavers who spin those beautiful webs. And the wasps that feed on spiders have simply vanished.

No more yellow jackets or blue mud dabbers. Blue mud dabbers like to prey on Black Widow spiders. Without them around, there is no controlling these venomous spiders.

We used to have hundreds of blue belly lizards who used to feed on crickets and sow bugs, but the lizard population is very much reduced now.. No wonder, their favorite diet of crickets is also down, and we have seen no sow bugs in years. Earthworm populations are gone.

I learned and observed these things through the years, since I owned my first house in 1980. The Sparrows disappeared in my big city, I didn't see one from maybe 1980's till recently. Now I see them here and there, but not in the numbers I saw them before. From my experience, they and all the birds that eat like them disappeared because of lawn sprays for chinch bug. I never used the stuff, instead I drown them with water. Moreover, the birds will find the chinch bugs by the dry patches they leave and wipe them out. While on the subject of lawns, all those manicured lawns all over the USA are fed weed and feed, read the label, it says not to let barefoot children or pets walk on it for 6 weeks. Why would anyone want that around their property?

I now live on a tract of acreage and do not use any poison whatsoever. I have no rats or mice because I keep the grass low and let the good snakes and the hawks, and owls do their thing. I have hardly any mosquitos because I do not leave containers around to catch water. The few mosquitos I have come from my neighbor who has hundreds of containers gathering water all around. I have Mud Daubers and spiders everywhere doing their thing.

The only poison I use is a dog flea "Frontline" type product (Frontline no longer kills fleas in my area, I had to switch to K9  Advantix II). These products only work for 30 days. When the Frontline quit working, I had a flea infestation in one of the barn, likely from a Possum living in there somewhere. When the dog has the Advantix on, he is a type of vacuum picking up fleas and killing them, but it is like clockwork, you have to put it on every 30 days. Therefore, I do not think it lingers.

Unfortunately the whole world around me uses lawn weed and feed, chinch bug spray, Roundup, mosquito spray and all other kinds of poisons that are not necessary.

Many years ago I knew a tropical fruit farmer who was not making a profit, and he decided to drop all the chemicals and pesticides to see what would happen. The first year his crop was down 50% (the weather really is not much of a factor where he lived) and he had a very slight monetary loss compared to using the pesticides. The second year was a little better,  it was a little more profitable that using the pesticides, but nothing to brag about. The third year he was making some money and from there he was doing well and was able to make a living. He had bigger crops with the pesticides but made no money. Without the pesticides he had a slightly smaller crop, but made a profit. He told me that as time went by, the beneficial insects and birds started appearing and eventually they did the work of the pesticides. He said the pesticides are like a drug, they wipe out everything, good and bad, and then you are dependent on the pesticide. Once you are dependent, the industry increases its prices till you are barely in business. That is what he experienced through the years. 

Here in Spokane, we have lots of bugs, maybe all the bugs are coming here because we also have an abundance of Tridentine Masses being offered all within reasonable driving distance from SSPX, Independent chapels, CMRI, to an Indult.

Ants, spiders, butterflies, beetles, ladybugs, (which BTW are named after the Blessed Mother).
Speaking of ladybugs, I was visiting a conservatory here in Spokane and on one of the tables, there was a leaflet all about how the ladybug was, and why it was named after the Blessed Mother.  I was surprised to find this information in a secular place instead of a church. 

Follow the bugs they know   

  "This topic is a joke... right?"

Nope.
Ducks like to eat insects as it a rich source of protein for them, but there is a shortage of insects.

http://www.handyman.net.au/how-get-rid-stink-bugs

Is this the stink bug you are referring to, Maria Regina? I relish catching them and drowning them.