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Open my wish list →Bats are winged mammals. Here are three true things about how they fly and how they rest.
Bats are the only mammals capable of true and sustained flight. Flying squirrels and sugar gliders glide instead. There are at least 1,500 known species of bat.
SourceA bat's wing is a skin that reaches from its arm and finger bones to the side of its body and its back legs. Before a bat is born, the webbing between the fingers of its front feet stays, and becomes its wings.
SourceWhen they are not flying, bats hang upside down from their feet. Their tendons let them hang from a roost with no effort.
SourceSeeing with sound
Most bats are nocturnal. Microbats, and a few megabats, send out ultrasonic calls to make echoes. Microbats make these calls through the mouth or the nose. By comparing each call with the echoes that come back, a bat can learn about its surroundings and find prey in the dark. Bat ears also pick up the sounds that prey makes, such as the fluttering of a moth's wings. Larger bats tend to use lower-pitched calls, and smaller bats higher ones. Echolocation only works over short distances, so microbats may use their eyes too, when travelling between their roosts and the places where they feed.
SourceBat babies
In most kinds of bat, a mother gives birth to a single pup at a time. A newborn pup can be up to 40 per cent of its mother's weight. In many species, females give birth and raise their young together in maternity colonies, and may help each other with the birth. Most of a young bat's care comes from its mother, though in species where a pair stays together, the father plays a part. In several species, a female may feed another mother's pup with her milk. Most young bats are weaned in under 80 days.
SourceCraseonycteris thonglongyai
Also called the bumblebee bat, this is the smallest species of bat. It measures about 29 to 33 mm long and weighs around 2 g. It has a pig-like snout and lives in limestone caves along rivers in western Thailand and southeast Myanmar.
SourcePteropus vampyrus
This southeast Asian bat is one of the largest bats, with a wingspan of up to 1.5 metres. It feeds only on fruits, nectar and flowers. It cannot echolocate, but has well-developed eyesight, and may fly up to 50 km to its feeding grounds in one night.
SourcePipistrellus pipistrellus
The common pipistrelle is the UK's smallest and most common bat. It is so small it can fit into a matchbox, yet it can easily eat 3,000 insects a night. It roosts in tree holes, bat boxes and even the roof spaces of houses.
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