Dead bee harbours rare hitchhiker
AQIS officer Nathan Luke with
the magnified larva-carrying bee
on screen
In order to make a formal identification and check for potential parasites on the dead bees, Adelaide AQIS officer Nathan Luke was positioning one of the lifeless specimens under a remote diagnostic microscope, for Perth based AQIS Entomologist Chris Norwood, when the bee began to move about.
Nathan and Chris were quite surprised to see the bee's abdomen begin to twitch, but it wasn't the bee miraculously coming back to life—it was the larva of another creature emerging from the bee that was the cause for concern.
'It was quite a shock—a mini scene from the movie Alien,' said Nathan.
Initially suspected of being a Khapra beetle larva (exotic to Australia and probably the most feared stored grain pest in the world), the specimen was placed in a vial of vinegar and sent to the Perth office where the difficult task of formal identification could begin. The specimen proved to be a rare species and was referred to a specialist from the WA Department of Agriculture and Food for positive identification.
Back in Adelaide, and pending formal identification, the shipping container and its cargo were fumigated and re-inspected. No further insect evidence was uncovered and the shipping container was cleaned with all residues removed for destruction.
Formal identification confirmed the larva to be species Reesa vespulae (Milliron, 1939) a species so rare it doesn't have a common name. The Australian Faunal Directory lists the beetle as present in the ACT and Murray Darling Basin but not found anywhere else in Australia.
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