World’s Largest Bee, Thought to be Extinct, Filmed Alive in The Wild

Wallaces giant bee AKA Megachile Pluto was first discovered in 1859, but since has only officially sighted once.

Wallaces giant bee is about four times the size of a honeybee.

THE WORLD’S LARGEST bee may also be the planet’s most elusive. First discovered in 1859 by the prominent scientist Alfred Russel Wallace, researchers could not locate it again since and it was presumed extinct.

But Wallace’s giant bee (Megachile pluto) was not gone.

Below you can see the bee filmed for the first time ever.

 

First ever time Wallace's giant bee has been filmed
First ever time Wallace’s giant bee has been filmed

 

 

In 1981, biologist Adam Messer discovered several Megachile nests on Bacan and neighboring islands.

A sight so rare that locals said they’d never before seen the nests. Again, it would be the only known sighting for decades.

Wallace described the bee, which is about four times the size of a honeybee, as a:

“large black wasp-like insect, with immense jaws like a stag-beetle.”

Now, for the first time, it has been photographed and filmed alive in the wild, by a team including nature photographer Clay Bolt.

Meanwhile, in the last year, two specimens of the insect have been sold on eBay for thousands of dollars, raising fears about its continued survival.

“To actually see how beautiful and big the species is in life, to hear the sound of its giant wings thrumming as it flew past my head, was just incredible.”

“It was absolutely breathtaking to see this ‘flying bulldog’ of an insect that we weren’t sure existed any more,” said Clay Bolt.

The bee, which grows up to an inch and a half long with a wingspan of 2.5 inches, has large mandibles that almost look like those of a stag beetle.

It uses them to scrape sticky resin off trees to build burrows within termite nests, where females raise their young. Like other bees, it feeds on nectar and pollen.

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