Bat Week, October 24 - October 31

Written By: Aimee Turcotte
​Bats are phenomenal animals typically shrouded in myths that make them feared and misunderstood. Many individuals are unaware of bats’ ecological importance in pest control, seed dispersal, and pollination. In this blog, we will uncover the truth about bats and how many of the resources we have would not be available without them.

​I attended an evening lecture at Connecticut’s Beardsley Zoo led by Keelyn Kotecki, a research student pursuing a master's at Southern Connecticut State University. She had the wonderful opportunity of becoming a bat expert by studying Vampire Bats in South America. During this lecture, she shared some general facts about bats that I found very interesting. Did you know that bats are the only mammals capable of true flight (1.)? Even though other mammals like flying squirrels can glide in the sky, they do not have the bone structure to support long flights. Bats have patagia, which are wing membranes that stretch over the bones of a bat’s wing to assist with wing flexibility and lift. Furthermore, bats are a part of the order Chiroptera, which can be split into two major suborder groups, Megachiroptera and Microchiroptera (1., 2.). Throughout the world, there are approximately 1,400 species of bats, so many that these bats make up 20% of all mammals (1.).

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Do bats ‘hang out’ together? Are they solitary or can they be social? Bats can be found in groups in natural roosts and man-made roosts (buildings, attics, etc.) (1.). Typical habitats for bats are in terrestrial areas below polar regions (2.). For instance, these animals can be found in open fields, temperate and tropical forests, suburban and urban environments, agricultural areas, and deserts. Living near sources of water can be beneficial for bats because bats can eat any insects that emerge from the water. Some bat species may prefer different types of roosts. One species may roost in caves while another may roost under logs. Additionally, one bat species may have different roost locations depending on the season. During the winter, one bat species may hibernate in caves while during the summer, they may roost on trees (2.). To help conserve bats, scientists and bat enthusiasts can make bat houses out of wood to provide these animals with habitat. The lighter the color of these houses, the better. Darker bat houses may absorb more heat, causing the bats to become overheated (1.).

Bats can have diverse diets demonstrated by different bat species being frugivores, insectivores, sanguivores, etc. (1.). Frugivores are bats that eat fruits, seeds, or pollen (4.). Insectivores mainly eat insects; the most common food bats eat. Sanguivores are bats that feed on the blood of other animals such as livestock (4.). Megachiroptera, a suborder of bats, has approximately 166 species and one family, Pteropodidae, also known as Old World tropics fruit bats (2., 3.). Pteropodidae has about 170 species and 41 genera (3.). Pteropodids are
vegetarians, eating foods such as nectar, pollen, and fruits (3.). Microchiroptera is the suborder of smaller bats that has 16 families and around 759 species. These bats are mainly insectivorous, but some can be carnivorous, fruit eaters, pollinators, etc. (2.). Some bats have adapted to having a long tongue to feed on the nectar of plants and therefore are nocturnal pollinators (1.). Interestingly, without bats, we would not have tequila, since tequila comes from agave plants that open at night to allow bats to feed on nectar! There are even fruit dispenser bats that consume seeds and then drop them to the ground (1.). Lastly, one species of bat in the Microchiroptera group feeds on the blood of other vertebrates (2.).

​Bats have echolocation, a biological sonar, to help hunt for food (1.). When bats are navigating in the dark, they emit high-frequency sound waves. The waves travel through the air until they hit an object. Once these sound waves collide with an object, they bounce back towards the bat while the bat listens with their big ears for returning echoes. The bats analyze the time it takes for the echoes to return and the frequency of the calls to identify the location, texture, size, and shape of the object. Interestingly, echolocation can even identify objects as small as human hair. Furthermore, the nose leaves of bats allow them to use their nostrils to emit calls to focus their echolocation skills, giving them more precise navigation and prey detection (1.).

Thank you for reading this blog. I hope you enjoyed learning about bats!

1. Keelyn Kotecki, Biology Department – SCSU. [email protected].
2. https://animaldiversity.org/accounts/Chiroptera/
3. https://animaldiversity.org/accounts/Pteropodidae/
4. https://askabiologist.asu.edu/bat-food