Scientists have found a new native bee that they’ve dubbed the Lucifer bee.
Megachile Lucifer was found by a researcher as she was observing a rare wildflower that grows in the Bremer Ranges in Western Australia, the BBC reported.
What makes the bee unusual are the “highly distinctive, prominent horns” that are on the female bee and helped give the species its devilish name.
“The female had these incredible little horns on her face,” Curtin University Dr. Kit Prendergast said in a news release announcing the discovery.
She said that she was inspired to name it Lucifer thanks to the Netflix show she was watching at the time of discovery.
The new bee was observed in 2019, but the study about it was just published.
Prendergast said the bee is the first new member of the group in 20 years.
“DNA barcoding confirmed the male and female were the same species and that it didn’t match any known bees in DNA databases, nor did the specimens I had collected morphologically match any in museum collections," Prendergast said.
While Lucifer normally embodies evil, it is Latin for “light bringer,” so the doctor also shines a light on native bee species conservation and understanding how endangered plants are pollinated.
Australia has about 2,000 native bee species and more than 300 do not have names, NBC News reported.
© 2025 Cox Media Group
