Scientists are nerds, and scientists who name insects appear to be particularly cheeky and pop-culture-obsessed nerds, so it kind of makes sense that some of them have named a bee after something a nerd says when he is tricking people on a TV show. I hadn’t seen the show in question, The Big Bang Theory, so if you haven’t either, here is what I found out: It’s not good, but it does feature a bunch of nerds, which are very popular these days. One of the nerds is named Sheldon, and when he explodes into full-on nerdiness he says “bazinga,” and other nerds get excited about it and wear it on T-shirts. Here is a video of him saying bazinga, A LOT.
And here is a photo of the bee they named Euglossa bazinga after this catchphrase.
This bee is a type of orchid bee, and like nerds, these bees are special. They are dependent on a certain form of orchid to keep themselves alive. Although recently, scientists discovered that their existence might be more important to the orchid than vice versa. At any rate, these bees’ habitat is being threatened, and scientists are not happy about this, and they hope the name choice will make people sit up and take notice. (We’ll make a deal with you: We pay attention to the bee, and in return we never, ever have to watch The Big Bang Theory.)
