Wonder Desert Beetle

The Stenocara beetle harvests water from fog

Imagine that you are in the desert. It hasn’t rained for hundreds of years and you are desperate for water. What do you do? The Stenocara beetle manages this situation all the time!

The Namib desert in Africa is about the driest, hottest place on earth.

So hot that lizards have to dance from foot to foot to keep their feet from being scorched!

So hot that a scientist studying heat survival techniques photographed a locust that had been instantly fried when it landed on the sand. But in the same photograph, three dark-winged beetles were happily feeding on the carcass, completely unperturbed by the extreme heat. What was their secret? Their great Designer made those beetles with special heat-shock chemicals inside their bodies which allow them to endure the extreme heat without suffering heat exhaustion. Plus their almost spherical bodies, about two centimeters in diameter, are suspended on thin, stilt-like legs, which have minimal contact with the hot sand. Less contact, less heat.

What about the water problem? Even a beetle needs water to survive. Where does it find water in a desert where it hasn’t rained in anyone’s memory?

Stilt-like legs of the Stenocara beetle minimize contact with the hot sand.

The only source of water in that hot desert is in an incredibly fine fog that sweeps off the Atlantic about once a week, carried by high winds. At night, when the desert cools, some of the water in the fog will condense. This is just enough water to sustain the life of some types of insects.

Harvesting Fog

How does one harvest water from fog? The Stenocara beetle living in the Namib desert, survives, thanks to the special God-given equipment it carries on its back! Yes, this beetle knows just how to harvest water from fog!

Have you noticed how water condenses on the inside of the windows in your home, or in your car? The beetle uses a similar method of water gathering.

Scientist Andrew Parker took on the task of discovering the beetle’s secret of survival.

Chemically testing a dead beetle, scientist Parker discovered that the beetle’s back is composed of fused wing covers. These wing covers are made of bumps visible to the naked eye. But under an electron microscope each bump, no larger than a human hair, is seen to be made up of many tiny mountain ranges. The mountain peaks actually attract water. In between the peaks are waxy-coated valleys that repel water. “This made us realize that the beetles’ unusual mountainous back wasn’t just for decoration,” says Parker. “And since wax repels water, we thought this structure must have something to do with collecting water.”

Observing the beetles further, the scientist found that when the fog blows in, the beetles tilt their bodies into the fog-laden wind (Where did they learn to do this!). As the fog passes across the beetle’s back, tiny droplets form on the peaks. Once the microscopic drops are large enough, they roll down into the waxy valleys, where they continue to grow in size. Eventually the droplets roll off the beetle’s back into a tiny channel that directs the water right into the beetle’s mouth, and Mr. Beetle gets a drink of water!

What fantastic stroke of evolution developed this wonder of interacting parts so the lowly beetle could drink in the desert?

Who but an All-Knowing Creator could design such an ideal apparatus, so that a fog that blows across the desert with gale speed several mornings a month could provide enough moisture for the beetle to live?

The Beetle’s Method Wins!
By standard methods, a one meter square sheet of plastic in a desert environment collects about three liters of water per day. However, in a studio experiment which copied methods learned from the Stenocara beetle, a one meter square sheet of plastic collected three liters of water in just twenty-five minutes! The grooves in between repelled the water down to containers below the plastic.
Pretty impressive—but would it ever have been thought of if the Stenocara beetle hadn’t been doing it first?

Shouldn’t we exclaim with Job of old, “I would seek God, and to God I would commit my cause—who does great things, and unsearchable, marvelous things without number” (Job 5:8-9). Who but our Creator and Designer knows how to provide for all His living creatures? Can we not thank Him, and trust Him to provide for our needs now, and even to make us able to keep on living—forever! “This is the promise He has promised us—eternal life” (1 John 2:25).

The same great, all-wise Designer is holding the gift of eternal life for all His children who meet His standard of upright conduct. “Blessed are they that do his commandments, that they may have right to the tree of life, and may enter in through the gates into the city” (Rev. 22:14).

Scientist Andrew Parker took on the task to discover the beetles’ secret of survival. He used an infrared camera to create thermal images of the beetles, to see if they had heat reflecting shells. His study was interrupted when he discovered a different structure sitting on top of the beetles’ heat reflector—a special surface for collecting water from desert fog.

Human hands have already started to copy the Stenocara beetle—with great success. They have designed prototypes based on the beetle’s water-collecting methods that have collected “several times more water than any conventional netting methods.”

“Animals are master engineers, so we copy them,” says scientist Parker.

We would like to rephrase that statement and say God is the Master Engineer, who has marvelously engineered intricate systems for the survival of His creatures. We should thank Him, as we copy His master works.

Sources of information:

Dr. Andrew Parker: Department of Zoology, University of Oxford (web page no longer available)
NewScientist.com Article
National Geographic.com
Guardian Unlimited or the Author’s Web Page
New Agriculturist on-line