Thousands of Years of Pastoralism Don’t Count: Coprophagous Beetles Prefer Exotic Alpaca Dung to That of Cattle

The European Alps host many species of dung beetles that feed on domestic and wild ungulate’s dung and provide many benefits to agricultural ecosystems. However, it is not clear whether dung beetles will feed on the dung of species introduced for commercial purposes from other geographical areas. Here, we investigated dung beetle feeding preferences by providing them with cow (local) and alpaca (introduced) dung in four pastures along an altitudinal gradient. We found that the number of species and abundance in the alpaca dung equals or exceeds those found in the cow dung. Moreover, some species showed clear preferences for alpaca dung while few preferred cow dung. Overall, our results suggest that dung beetle plasticity in feeding habits allows them to readily exploit the dung of introduced species and that alpaca dung can help maintain dung beetle richness in the studied area.