Although the subject matter may be a bit sensitive, there is some exciting news for fruit bats. Two-thirds of female short-nosed fruit bats, Cynopterus sphinx, regularly perform fellatio on their male partners, according to a recently released study.
Around 22,000 “large flying foxes” — the largest fruit bat in the world — are legally killed every year in Peninsular Malaysia by hunters. At this rate, scientists say the bat could go extinct in the near future.
Biological and ecological scientists around the world are waiting for stability to return to Madagascar and are using what political muscle they have to convince the new government to restore stability, and to resume and expand its eco-tourism trade. The survival of one of the world’s last, great, biodiversity hot spots depends on it.
A fungal infection in the Northeastern Little Brown bat (Myotis lucifugus) known as white-nose syndrome has been sickening bats for the past three years. The illness strikes worst when the bats are at their most vulnerable–during their winter hibernation period.
The disease, which presents as white patches on the bats’ skin and disrupts their winter “sleep”, kills nearly 80% of those stricken. Essentially, the infection causes the bats to rouse from their hibernatory rest repeatedly, and so, to stay warm, they [...]
A new species of Samoan fruit bat or ‘flying fox’ was discovered at the Academy of Sciences in Philadelphia by Kristofer M. Helgen, a Research Zoologist and Curator of Mammals at the Smithsonian’s National Museum of Natural History. Helgen, the lead author of the paper published in American Museum Novitates, noticed the bat within one hour of being on the premises of the Academy of Sciences. (There are about 17 million biological specimens housed at the Academy.)
It’s still not clear what is killing the bat populations, but what is known is that bats with WNS wake up more frequently from their winter hibernation which means they use up their fat stores, forcing them to leave the caves to seek food before the insect populations are around so that they simply starve to death.
After years of unrequited calls to help the animal, conservationists have asked the government to begin an emergency breeding program for the tiny bat. Environment Minister responded by announcing breeding trials for a similar yet non-threatened population elsewhere to test the viability of breeding the pipistrelle.
Conservationists fear that it may be too little, too late.
The population has been in a rapid decline for the last fourteen years. Yet the reasons for the serious drop-off are still not clear.
A colony of giant African bats has made a dramatic return from the brink of exctinction, thanks to a conservation drive discouraging people from eating them as delicacies.
As recently as 1989, the Pemba Flying Fox, one of Africa’s largest bat species, was critically endangered, with only a few individuals left on Pemba Island, off the coast of Tanzania. Since an intervention by Flora and Fauna International (FFI), numbers have soared to a staggering 22,000.
According to conservation worker, Joy Juma, “At one time roast bat was a very common dish on Pemba. Now people value the bats for different reasons.”
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