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Bolt first caught a glimpse of the giant -- albeit dead -- bee in 2015, when he visited the American Museum of Natural History in New York City, he said.

\"It was more magnificent than I could have imagined, even in death,\" Bolt wrote.

In late January, Bolt and three others flew to Indonesia because it was the same time of year that researcher Adam Messer last encountered the bee in 1981, Bolt said.

\"PHOTO:
Clay Bolt/AFP/Getty Images
PHOTO: This undated handout picture provided by Global Wildlife Conservation, Feb. 21, 2019, shows entomologist and bee expert Eli Wyman with the first rediscovered individual of Wallaces giant bee (Megachile pluto) in Indonesia.
>

After arriving in Ternate, one of Bolt's guides, Iswan, ended up having a \"very sharp set of eyes and a passion for insects,\" he wrote. The bee, which is known to nest in active termite mounds inside of trees, emerged on the last day of searching on a low termite mound about 8 feet from the ground.

\"We immediately noticed that it had a hole in it, like many other nests we’d seen, but this one was a little more perfect,\" Bolt wrote. \"It was very round, and just the size that a giant bee might use.\"

Iswan then exclaimed that he saw something move, the other climbed up to determined that the they had \"rediscovered Wallace's Giant Bee.\"

\"After doing a happy dance, I photographed the bee and shot some video proof,\" Bolt said. \"My goal was to be the first person to make a photo of a living Wallace’s Giant Bee and I had achieved that goal.\"

Bolt now hopes to work with conservation groups to ensure protection for the species.

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