An up-and-coming entomologist, who is only 4 years old, has made a discovery as rare as she is — a small population of stingless bees thriving in Pa

Rare stingless bees discovered by 4-year-old in California

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2021-08-31 12:00:04

An up-and-coming entomologist, who is only 4 years old, has made a discovery as rare as she is — a small population of stingless bees thriving in Palo Alto.

The unique bees discovered by junior naturalist Annika Arnout apparently originated in Brazil, having arrived decades ago as part of research to help revive the waning bee population in the US, according to Dr. Martin Hauser, a senior insect biosystematist at California’s Department of Food and Agriculture Plant Pest Diagnostics Branch, CBS News reports.

Brazil is home to several unidentified species of stingless bees — akin to various pollinating bee species, such as honey bees.

“In 1950, the USDA asked a Brazilian researcher to send them bee colonies to see, to have alternative pollinators,” Hauser told CBS. “He sent them in the ’50s to Gainesville, Florida, Logan, Utah and Davis and Palo Alto. And he said all the bees died in one year.”

The bees couldn’t survive the cold climate and Utah, or “compete” with the hardy bee populations of Florida, said Hauser.

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