By the end of this century, as many as 20% of South East Asia’s bat species are predicted to become globally extinct. For me personally, this a great tragedy, but then I’ve been working with tropical bats for over 17 years, so you might say I’m a little biased! So why should anyone else care about our flying fluffy friends? Well, one of the reasons, is just what an extraordinary loss in species and ecological diversity this represents. To back up a bit — just how many bat species do you suppose there are in the world? I nearly always start off my talks to the general public with this question, because the answer usually comes as quite a surprise to people. I won’t keep you in suspense — the current count is over 1100 species, but it is increasing every year as new areas are explored, and as molecular (genetic) techniques reveal to us much of their hidden diversity. Bats make up a fifth of all mammals, and are found on all continents except Antarctica.

What is so incredible, is that this extraordinary species diversity is matched by incredible ecological diversity. What I mean by this is there is a great range of ways in which bats make a living, from the foods they eat to where they roost, and who they roost with. Although the majority of species eat insects, many depend on plants (fruit and nectar), while there are also fish-eating bats, carnivorous bats and even the infamous blood-eating bats (and just to allay your fears, there are actually only three species of vampire bats in the world, restricted to Central and South America). Overlying this is a huge range of roosting habits and social systems. Some bats just roost on their own under leaves in the forest, others live in caves with over a million individuals. There is pretty much a bat for every occasion (and research interest — which is why so many biologists study them!).

OK, so I’m not supposed to have favorites, but this chap (the Trefoil Horseshoe Bat) here is definitely one of them. This is an insectivorous bat from the study site in Peninsular Malaysia where it typically lives on its own, just roosting under palm or rattan leaves quite low in the forest understorey. Its predominantly a perch-hunter, meaning it dangles from a branch, blasting the area below it with echolocation signals until it detects an insect flying below. It then swoops out to catch the insect before returning to the perch to eat. The elaborate yellow noseleaf helps focus the echolocation signal which is emitted through the nostrils.