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Today:
Sandra Steiger of the University of Bayreuth in Germany and her colleagues recently reported on an American species, Nicrophorus orbicollis -- a handsome, inchlong burying beetle with orange and black stripes -- in which both parents care for their young. A parent beetle will eat a bit of carrion, predigest it and, on being tapped on the mouth by an offspring's front legs, transfer the morsel into the little supplicant's mouth.
"It's like kiss-feeding," Dr. Steiger said. "It looks really nice." But as the researchers demonstrated, there is more to the osculatory exchange than pulped meat: the parent's oral fluids are also critical to the young beetle's survival.
Nothing says love like kiss-feeding...?:) I like "little supplicant", too: that's what I'm going to start calling my younger son, the college freshman!