Member-only story
The Volcano, the Flame Tree and the Bee: the Rediscovery of the Cloaked Bee (Pharohylaeus lactiferus)
It has been a time for rediscoveries. A Youtube video of man with a celebratory beer in his hand went viral when the man announced he had indisputable evidence of Thylacines alive and thriving in Tasmania. A few days later, headlines heralded the discovery of another enigmatic striped creature that was back from the dead — a bee, not seen for almost a century, had been found in tropical Queensland.
The Thylacines turned out to be Tasmanian Pademelons, chunky little forest kangaroos, small and unstriped, but the bee was real. After an intensive search by entomologist James B. Dorey, the Cloaked Bee (Pharohylaeus lactiferus) had been found at three locations in north-eastern Queensland: Eungella near Mackay, Kuranda near Cairns, and Halloran’s Hill in Atherton. It had last been seen in 1923.
From the lookout at Halloran’s Hill Conservation Park, the land drops away to maize and sugar cane paddocks punctuated with volcanic cinder cones and patches of rainforest. On the horizon, the peaks of the Bellenden Ker Range disappear beneath low cloud.
