Macrophages gain a partner at the table: epidermal cells digest peripheral dendritic debris in Drosophila.

In this issue of Neuron , Han et al. (2014) develop powerful methods to visualize phagocytosis of Drosophila peripheral sensory neuron dendrites. Remarkably, epidermal cells rather than professional phagocytes are the primary mediators of debris clearance, using both familiar and new molecular players.