The scientific community is all abuzz about the discovery of a gigantic bee in Indonesia.
Known as Wallace’s giant bee, it has a wingspan of 2.5 inches. Researchers last saw the bee in 1981 and feared it was extinct.
That fear changed to elation last month after entomologist Eli Wyman and wildlife photographer Clay Bolt traveled to Indonesia in hopes of seeing if the giant bee was still around.
Members of Wyman and Bolt’s crew conducted most of their search in the country’s forests, as the giant bee had been known to nest in active, tree-dwelling termite mounds, according to a post Bolt wrote for Global Wildlife Conservation.
Bolt, Wyman and their crew spent days searching for the bee and considered giving up after one person on the team came down with a heat-induced illness.
But their luck changed when Iswan, an Indonesian guide and conservationist who was part of the team, spotted something. As Bolt described it:
That day we walked down an old orchard road flanked on both sides by mixed lowland forest and fruit trees. Iswan, ever the eagle eye, spotted a low termite mound, around eight feet from the ground.
He later recounted that he almost didn’t mention it to us because, like the rest of the team, he was feeling tired and hungry. However, I’ll forever be grateful that he did because as we scampered up an embankment to the nest, we immediately noticed that it had a hole in it, like many other nests we’d seen, but this one was a little more perfect. It was very round, and just the size that a giant bee might use.
Bracing the rotting tree, I asked Iswan if he would mind climbing up to take a look inside. As he peered inside the nest he exclaimed, ‘I saw something move!’
Jumping down, for fear that the creature was a snake—his worst fear—after catching his breath, he said that it looked wet and sticky inside. Eli and I looked at each other with reserved excitement. Eli climbed up and immediately felt for certain that it was a bee nest. The structure was just too perfect and similar to what we expected to find. I climbed up next and my headlamp glinted on the most remarkable thing I’d ever laid my eyes on. I simply couldn’t believe it: We had rediscovered Wallace’s Giant Bee.”
Bolt said he first did a “happy dance” before photographing the bee in its natural habit.
Here’s how the bee compares in size to a typical honeybee:
(Photo: Clay Bolt)
The bee may have been rediscovered, but Bolt told Gizmodo that no one knows how many of the bees are still around or what their preferred habitats are.
He hopes to work with researchers and conservation groups in Indonesia to set up protection for the bee, possibly by elevating it as an avatar of local biodiversity.
Still, Bolt said the rediscovery is good news at an otherwise dark time for Earth’s biodiversity.
“This really offered me hope. There’s so much bad news that’s coming out, with all these species being lost, and I think sometimes it’s easy to just give up and say ‘there’s no hope for anything,’” Bolt told Gizmodo.
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We’ve long since recognized that women have more value than just having babies. But tell that to bees. The queen bee’s only job is to lay eggs, without which the hive will die. The queen doesn’t get to leave the house either, except for once to mate with several drones. From these encounters she will store the sperm to last her entire lifetime. A hive only has one queen bee at a time. But any young female bee, less than 48 hours old, can become a queen bee once fed a special food called “royal jelly” by the workers. That's a queen bee is pictured in the center.
In Some Places, Beekeeping Is Illegal
Despite the delicious and unique flavors of local honey, in nearly a hundred cities beekeeping is still illegal. What gives? Well, people are afraid of swarms of angry bees hanging out next door for one. It’s an inaccurate perception, however. The cultivated species of honeybee is not aggressive and rarely stings any bystanders. They’re also seen as a sort of exotic pet, instead of a hobby akin to backyard gardening. Bees were only outlawed in New York City in 1999, along with a list of exotic animals like vulture, ferrets and whales. (Which begs the question, who is trying to keep a whale as a pet?) Luckily for the many honey enthusiasts, in 2010, beekeeping in New York City was legalized again. As for the other cities? Let’s just hope they see the light. Pictured is an anonymous Brooklyn beekeeper flouting the law before beekeeping was legalized.
Honey Might Be The New Antibiotic
Honey has been touted as a remedy for a wide variety of ailments. It hasn’t been proven conclusively, but some say eating local honey can help with allergies, kind of like a pollen vaccine. The sweet, sticky stuff has also been recommended for small cuts and abrasions and sore throats. But scientists have also made a discovery that points to honey being a remedy for antibiotic-resistant strains of bacteria. Scientists found the component of honey, called defensin-1, that is responsible for honey’s antibacterial properties. They hope it can someday be used to treat burns and skin infections, or be used to develop new drugs.
They Have Been Suffering From A Mysterious Disorder
It started in October of 2006, and it has no apparent cause. Some 30 to 90 percent of hives just disappear, leaving behind the queen, honey, and immature bees, but no dead bodies. Where do they go? It’s called Colony Collapse Disorder. Although bees are essential to many crops like almonds and fruit, there isn’t a food crisis. Yet. Hive prices have been rising as demand for pollinators increase and supplies fall. So what is the reason for this? No particular cause has been isolated. According to the USDA, several possibilities have been identified: pesticides, stress, a pathogenic gut microbe called Nosema, high levels of infection by the varroa mite, poor nutrition due to apiary overcrowding, pollinating of crops with low nutritional value (GMO corn anyone?), exposure to contaminated water sources, or migratory stress brought about by increased needs for pollination. The USDA thinks it might be a combination of these factors. This isn’t the first widespread bee disappearance. Honeybee disappearances were mentioned in the 1880s, 1920s and 1960s. There’s no way to know, however, if those are related to the current Colony Collapse Disorder.
They Are Incredibly Valuable
According to the USDA, bee pollination is responsible for $15 billion in added crop value. They pollinate nut, berry, fruit, and vegetable crops, and the USDA claims that about one third of our diet directly or indirectly benefits from honeybee pollination. The California almond crop alone uses 1.3 million colonies of bees, which is about half of all the bees in the US. Overall, honeybees are estimated to contribute $15 to 20 billion annually. That’s not just for crops. We get beeswax from them for cosmetics and candles, inspiration for architecture and design, and of course honey.
They Can Live Almost Anywhere
Bees don’t just flourish in lush, temperate climates. They can be found in the desert, rain forests, and even tundra. Desert bees, who are slightly smaller than a housefly, have synced their lifecycle with that of the desert rains. Desert bee larvae wait patiently in the soil for a good opportunity to come out. Triggered by rains, the small bees emerge and flit from blossoming flower to blossoming flower. They don’t produce honey like their cousins and don’t have a queen bee. Tundra bees have a furry coat to trap heat, and “shiver” their flight muscles to generate heat. Some of these bumblebees can keep their body temperatures 68 to 86 degrees above air temperatures, so they can fly around while other insects are hiding out from extreme cold.
They Have A Tendency to Annoy New Yorkers
Maybe this is why New Yorkers are afraid of bees. Twice bees have swarmed in inconvenient places in New York City. In June 2010 they chose Cipriani’s on Wall Street for a temporary home. Some 15,000 bees swarmed on the high-end restaurant's doors while bee scouts went out looking for a new home. In July of 2009, they set up camp outside of the GameStop in Union Square, trapping employees inside until the NYPD bee expert could come to the rescue. It's a regular event for bees to leave the hive and head off to find a new area. It just becomes annoying when, like in New York City, there aren't many natural places to hang their hat, er, their hive. However, experts think it's an overall win for the environment to have them in places like New York, despite these occasional occurrences.
They’ve Been Around A While
Honeybees appeared on the scene 130 million years ago in Africa, when Africa, India, South America, and Australia were all one continent called Gondwana. Honeybees actually aren’t native to North America. They migrated here from Europe with humans in the early 17th century. They were also brought to New Zealand, Australia, and Tasmania during the same time to complete their trek around the globe. Present-day North American bees are a mix of several types of European bees. Then there are the aggressive Africanized bees making their way up from the south. Watch out for those!
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