Semi-fresh to almost dried cattle dung pats were collected weekly in a pasture of Brachiaria decumbens Stapf, from May of 1990 to April of 1992. The faeces were placed into opaque plastic buckets (15 l) with oppenings at the sides and on the top, occluded with flasks to capture adult coprophagous beetles present in the pats. A total of 18.844 Scarabaeidae specimens were collected, belonging to 37 species of the Genera: Ataenius, Aphodius. Agamopus, Pedaridium, Trichillum, Eurysternus, Dichotomius, Ontherus, Ateuchus, Sulcophanaeus, Gromphas, Digitonthophagus, Onthophagus, and Canthon. Approximately 57% of the species were endocoprids, 35% were paracoprids, and 8% were telecoprids. The most frequent, constant, and abundant species were; Onthophagus hirculus (Mannerheim), Aphodius nigrita (Fabr.), and Ataenius sp.1 (Harold).
Insecta; dung beetles; pasture; ecology
