A new moth species was found flitting around the Appalachian Mountains, and researchers decided to name it after the Cherokee.
The species, dubbed Cherokeea attakullakulla, has most likely been frequenting the region for millions of years, a Pensoft Publishers news release reported.
The first humans to occupy these ridges were Native Americans that called themselves the Cherokee. Researchers suspect they did not have a name for the small winged insect or distinguish it from other moths.
In 1958 Doctor John G. Franclemont of Cornell University was studying insects he had collected during at the Highlands Biological Station when he noticed two specimens were different from each other. The species was not seen again until Dr. J. Bolling Sullivan III, now a retired biologist formerly working with the Duke University Marine Lab noticed the same species differentiation in moths collected from the region.
The researcher teamed up with Eric Quinter, a retired entomologist from the American Museum of Natural History in New York City, who has been studying the group of moths for decades, to describe the species. Quinter had knowledge of the moths' unique habitats, called canebrakes. He has also revealed the presence of at least two dozen previously unknown moths and butterflies whose caterpillars feed on the native bamboo that make up these canebrakes.
The moth was given its name, Cherokeea attakullakulla, to honor the Cherokee nation as well as one of their most beloved leaders Chief Attakullakulla. The chief traveled through London and the Carolinas in the 1730s to represent his people and negotiate their treaties.
"Fortunately, today much of this wondrous place and its extraordinarily diverse biota remains preserved as the Great Smoky Mountains National Park, and the memory of those who first settled there remains immortalized in a tiny creature oblivious to it all," Quinter said.
