Newly Discovered Bee Species Has Some Strange Habits
A graduate student exploring the Grand Staircase at Escalante National Park in Utah stumbled upon what looked like grey bees making nests inside of sandstone. Being a bug expert, the young budding entomologist in training set out to find out more about these particular bee specimens. So he wound up snooping through the USDA’s collection of pollinating insects, and sure enough, his grey bee was among the thousands of specimens.
The specimens he was looking for, and found, did not have a species name associated with the sample. However, the name of the man who found the grey bee specimen was marked on the paperwork from forty years prior. So nobody has made any mention of this strange bee in forty years, and even then, the bee was not given an official name.
The man that originally found the bee was successfully tracked down by the curious graduate student. The older bug-expert had never published any literature regarding the grey bee, not even its ability to dwell inside of rock. The two bug-experts then proceeded to return to the sandstone sight where the bugs were found to take notes and more samples. Soon the two experts will publish the first article about these bees together.
Do you think that there are a lot of insect specimens that are found but are simply filed away and forgotten about before they could be researched?