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Part-Time Genius

How Close Are We to Resurrecting a Woolly Mammoth?

Part-Time Genius

iHeartPodcasts and Kaleidoscope

Society & Culture

4.52K Ratings

🗓️ 18 July 2025

⏱️ 32 minutes

🧾️ Download transcript

Summary

Will and Mango dig wonder: how hard it is to bring a species back from extinction?

Transcript

Click on a timestamp to play from that location

0:00.0

This is an I-Heart podcast.

0:07.5

Welcome to part-time genius, the production of I-heart Radio.

0:16.0

Guess what, Will?

0:17.0

What's that, Mango?

0:17.9

So, did you know the world's largest bee isn't as extinct as we thought?

0:21.5

Not as extinct as we thought. I kind of feel like that's too bad? No, it's actually a good thing.

0:27.9

How are giant monster bees a good thing? So for starters, the bees aren't exactly monsters. They're

0:33.9

only about an inch and a half long, and they've got a two and a half inch wing span. So it's

0:38.3

about the size of a thumb, or I guess three times the size of the average honeybee, not the size of Mothra, like you might be imagining. I mean, maybe not, but I actually just pulled up a picture of one of these things while you were talking. And I have to say, this is the most terrifying bee I have seen in my life.

0:34.9

Why do they have such

0:35.9

massive pinchers

0:37.4

on their faces?

0:38.1

They almost look like talking. And I have to say, this is the most terrifying bee I have seen in my life. Like, why do they have

0:55.2

such massive pinchers on their faces? They almost look like these stag beetles, but just creepier.

1:00.8

Yeah, so I was trying not to mention that because it makes them look so much scarier,

1:04.0

but they're actually just used to scrape resin off trees to build their homes. So it's not that

1:09.2

scary. But here's what's really interesting.

1:11.8

The species was first discovered in Indonesia, and this was back in 1859.

1:16.2

And then nobody could find it again after that.

1:18.7

So it was just presumed to have gone extinct.

1:21.1

And then in 1984, this entomologist stumbled across the bees alive and well in Indonesia.

1:26.5

And he collected the specimen.

...

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