Beetle Oil!
Hello everyone, how are you feeling today?
Today's prompt is quite a practical one, I had barely known that beetle excrete oil from their body which can be poisonous to humans. I think it is a defense mechanism, something to protect themselves from any form of attack. But not all beetle excrete oil, there are specific beetles that are identified with this.
Blister beetles in the genus Meloe are called oil beetles because of a yellowish oil they excrete from their joints when squeezed or distressed. This oil contains cantharidin, an irritating chemical that can cause blistering in many people. Link
Named for the oily, poisonous droplets that they secrete from their joints when disturbed, oil beetles of the genus Meloe and their family, Meloidae, the blister beetles, have been insect apothecaries for millennia. Link
I shared some of these information above so you can be familiar with the beetle that excrete oil from their body.
It occurred to me that if this oil excreted by the beetle were to be medicinal instead of poisonous, it will do us all a huge favor and perhaps this kind of beetle would be scarce, if not extinct.
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