Going Batty: Celebrating Bats on International Bat Appreciation Day

 In this episode of Wildly Curious (formerly For the Love of Nature), co-hosts Katy Reiss and Laura Fawks Lapole celebrate International Bat Appreciation Day by diving into the world of bats. With over 1,400 species worldwide, bats are second only to rodents in terms of diversity. From microbats with insect-eating abilities to the massive fruit bats, they explore what makes these misunderstood creatures so fascinating. Discover why bats hang upside down, how echolocation works, and the critical role bats play in ecosystems. Tune in for a fun and informative episode that just might change how you see these winged mammals!

Perfect for bat lovers, nature enthusiasts, and anyone curious about the amazing adaptations of bats.

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Hello and welcome to For The Love of Nature, a podcast where we tell you everything you need to know about nature, and probably more than you wanted to know. I'm Laura. And I'm Katie. And today is International Bad appreciation day. Woohoo. Woo. Which everybody knows if you've listened to these before. I love bats. Um, yeah, they're so cool. They are so neat. I think that they get a bad rap way too much. They're not creepy. They're, they're just really, really creepy. No, I actually think they're pretty cute in almost every way. There are some that are like real freaky looking, but in general, I think bat's are pretty cute. They are they're really, really neat. So we're gonna be talking about just all. All kinds of fats. Yeah. Kinda like bat 1 0 1 a little bit. I, I think you could say, yeah, I would say bat 1 0 1 and like we'd love to dive in deeper, probably in another future episode or bring on an expert to talk. Yes. Um, but Katie and I talked about how like today we're just gonna go over, you know, like what makes BAT special, and then we'll split it up between. The two different major groups of bats. So Katie, you wanna give the intro? Yeah, yeah, yeah. I'll give you a little bit of basic information. So bats are pretty much found all over the world. They're a total of 1400 species spread out throughout the planet and while they are, which is wild. Yeah, I mean, I don't know all 1400, but now that I saw like a number, I'm like, I'm gonna know them all. I was just gonna say, oh, I would be, dude, the most best person. No, I'm determined. Best person. I am determined to know them all. Well, I know it's only what, second to rodents, I think. I don't think so. I, I think it's only second to rodents by the amount of species that there are. I just, they're so cool cuz they're just so cool and they're so diverse. They're so specialized. Yeah. So interesting. All right. So what makes bats unique compared to other mammals then? Well, flight for, first of all, they're the only mammals that are capable of stained flight. Mm-hmm. Like actual flying, not not gliding. Yeah. Or falling with style kind of. So it is definitely an actual flight. So their wings are modified arms with elongated, which is so cool. They're little, which is, yeah, it is. They just have elongated fingers. And then there's the thin membrane. In between there. And so there's, I would say four different things that make them different. And flight and then the unique anatomy are kind of, you know, one and two right there. So they go together because it is interesting. It's so, it's their pinky ring finger and I think part of their middle finger. If you were kind of look at that and that's how those elongated fingers. And then in between those is really, really thin membrane and what I mean thin I. Then like almost C through. Yeah. Yes. And oh God, whenever I was in Australia, there are so many bats get tangled in barbed wire fences. So sad. Oh, like big fruit bats and stuff. Oh, so sad. But they are gnarly. Gnarly. That membrane, once it gets ripped, Ugh, my bad. Ooh. That ation is to think about. Cause I think about the webbing between my own fingers and it's not even that thin. Yep. Right. Yeah. So horrible. So, all right, so flight and then the unique anatomy that they have. Hold on one second. Uh, the other thing that as far as anatomy goes, besides like the fingers, of course they have the large years complex auditory systems that allows 'em to hear and interpret echoes of echolocation calls or other things. I'm gonna talk about. Yeah, I'm gonna talk about that more with mine. Okay, perfect. Well the other thing is, is echolocation, so most bats do use echo location. I'm gonna talk about some research that's been going. Because Laura's gonna talk about more of the micro bats and everything. I'm gonna be talking about fruit bats. And for a long time, well, I don't wanna get into it, but yeah. Yeah, we'll talk about echo location. Yeah. But so echo location, Laura, I'll go ahead and let you cover more into that. But echo location. And then the fourth one is that they're the only mammals that hang upside down for on a consistent basis. No other mammals sense. We're opening a head rush. I like to hang out upside down in a tree every once in a while myself, but I can't. But not for any long period of time. Can't, gosh, I can't take that pressure. I don't know why. Well, maybe now as an adult it might be different. It's been a while, but, uh, try it because I can't, like showing Luke, even like a hand, like a headstand or something, I'm like, ugh, can't do it. I could get a head rush now. Oh my. Oh God. Yeah, Laura wants to be upside down all the time now. That's her new thing, dude. That's Luke all the time. Like he will lay off the side of the couch. Yeah, with his head down. Laura. Laura goes. So she can only say, she can't say it all right now, but she goes A down, A down, right. And then she's pointing at the floor and I'm like, you go upside down. And she goes, mama. Mama and she wants me to go upside down on the floor. So all I have to do is bend over and put my head on the floor and then she'll do it next to me. So we're just looking at each other upside down. Um, kids are weird, man. It's all about being upside down. Yeah. In church. Yeah, like on Easter, she's just upside down in my lap. Just giggling. Yeah. Hanging over the side of my legs. Well, besides, you know, young children, bats are the only mammals that consistently hang upside down. So why do they hang upside down? Well, because it's an efficient way for them to rest and conserve energy. If you think about like us, whenever we're sitting upright, all the, we don't quite realize it cuz we're adapted for it. But all the energy that we expend to. Us upright it. There's actually a lot that goes into it. Hence why laying down is so relaxing. Like, like. But why if thats lay down instead of hang upside down. Well, because think about it. If they're gonna be. Flying. Oh, right, right. Like Right. They're flying, they're not ready for flight. They can't lounge. Yeah. They can't sprawl off their sides though. A whole tree of just lounging bats, that would be actually upside down. Just chilling. Just lounging. Yeah, because that does, if a predator or whatever comes, you know, nearby, they can literally just let go of their back feet and then drop into a flight. So that's another reason why they hang ups and ounce of lay. But it would be really, really, I was just reading today that y it's a misconception that they go to the bathroom upside down. Correct. Which has got me cool. Cuz I definitely think that people think that they go to the bathroom upside down. I've, I think I have, is it video or picture? I have one or the other whenever I was in Australia that I didn't even know I got but of bats going to the bathroom that they just flip up and hold on with their thumbs. Yeah. Just it's like a ver Yeah, like a, like, I don't even know how to describe it, but. I don't wanna say it's cute, but it is because it's like they're little FIEs, like Yeah. They're little thumb that they've got. Yeah. But they give birth upside down. Right? Um, I don't remember. I think I've seen a video of that happening, which seems insane from any, any ladies out there that has given birth. Can you imagine fighting gravity on that one? Upside down. What the heck? And then having to catch the baby before it falls. Right. Another benefit about hanging upside down is that it helps bats regulate their body temperature. So because bats have high surface area to volume ratio, they lose heat quickly. You think about those wings. Yeah, right. Because there are blood vessels and everything through those wings. When and so. All of that skin, everything being exposed to air. So by hanging upside down, they can re reduce the surface area and minimize heat loss. That's why they kind of all curl up. Mm-hmm. Like they wrap their wings around them. Cause it I know just it's like a, like yeah, like a little blanky. I get it. And then there's some other research that's shine that it's also thought to be beneficial for bats, respiratory and circulatory. When about hangs upside down its lungs and hearts are prepositioned it in a way that allows for optimum blood flow and oxygen exchange. Which would make sense cuz they've evolved that way. Yeah. You know what I mean? Like, like we wouldn't be like that. Yeah. We get a head rush. Our bodies aren't meant to hang upside down. We literal really die from hanging upside down for too long. Yeah. Ugh. So anyways, so that's a brief, brief overview on just bats in. Okay, cool. Well if you don't mind, I'll go first. Go ahead. Um, so I'm doing the micro bats, also known as micro Chitra. And that's 70% of all bat species. Yep. There's a couple of things that make, that allows us to lump them together. The big thing and kind of how, what I was thinking about splitting this podcast was about doing the insect wars. So most of mine, most, most of the micro bats are insect wars, which means that they eat insects. This is the majority of also what is found in the us. And like Katie said, these species can be found all over the world except for a few islands and the polar. So a general description of the micro bats is that they are generally smaller with wingspans of less than two. Of course there's always exceptions in nature. But the most extreme of this is the smallest bat, which is the kitties hog nose bat. Mm-hmm. Which weighs about the weight of two Skittles. It's, which is the, the best way to think about measurements two Skittles and is the size of a bumblebee. Ah, that's so cute. Um, so yeah, they're generally tiny, which makes sense because if you have to be eating insect, You can't be too big because they're just like, you have to be eating far too many insects. You have to be small if you're gonna be an insect eater. They also typically have very large ears in proportion to the rest of their body size to help them with echo location. They have small eyes but they're not blind or anything like that They can see about as well as a human can. And they typically have tiny scrunched or pug face. They just, they don't need a lot of face and they got big ears. Why is their face scr out? They just don't need a lot of face. They don't need it. Well, also, they also think that it can help them to, it helps with echolocation. The more wrinkles there are. Yeah, just funny to think about. So the micro batts can be divided further into some other categories, depending on other behaviors or adaptations such as where they hibernate. You can divide them into the tree hibernators or the cave hibernators. Trees Are you? The bats of the hibernating trees are usually solitary and the cave one s are typically gregarious, meaning they're very social or buildings crevices. Chimneys, right? Because urbanization, anything else that they can find anywhere, nook and cranny. Bats can be, yep. You could divide them based on how many babies they usually have. Really all of these categories, these micro batts can kind of be split into the two. You've got the ones that hibernate in trees. Those guys usually have twins or more. Some of them have up to four babies at a time. They're typically solitary in general, like they don't raise their babies in groups. They hibernate alone. And the ones that hibernate trees typically have furry tails because they use those tails as a blanket because they don't cuddle up with their friends. Yep. Which is cute. The ones that hibernate in caves, like I said, they usually are doing everything together. They hibernate together, they raise their babies together. Although, interestingly enough, they only have one pup, which is what you call a baby bat. You'd think if you were gonna be in a big social setting, you could afford to have lots of babies since everyone's just watching your kids. And that if you had to be alone, you wouldn't have as many children. Yeah, but it's not like that. I don't know. And they have less hair on their. And then one other way you could divide up the micro bats, depends on how they feed. So there are the aerial insectivores, which means those that eat on the wing, which are the ones that we're typically thinking about, but there's also ones that are called insect insectivorous Gleaners. Which are the ones that eat insects and other prey from the ground or off of vegetation. So the aerial insect wars, the ones that are eating on the wing, they're going for the small bugs that are flying around. Teenies. Yeah. Mobs, mosquitoes, G Nats, things like that. The Gleaners are going for the bigger stuff. So they are more of like pouncing on their. And scooping it up and they're getting like Katie DIDs and gr like larger, you know, grass hoppers, crickets, things like that. So they can afford to spend more energy getting those larger meals. Yeah. And that's how we did the, that's how we did the bat research. So we, whenever we were doing census counts, I, I think I've told the story at least a couple times on it, maybe we would put up the mist nets, which are like these very thin, like string. Yeah, they go up and down, and then at the bottom of these strings, it's almost like a v and then on, on the v on top of the V there's plastic. All right. And so they can, they, they're just flying, minding their own business, getting clothes line, just getting clothes line fall down into the bottom of the V. They're, they're completely okay, is horrible as they're making it sound, they're completely. And then once they get hit, like let say fly into the string and then they're like, oh my goodness, I gotta crawl. Like, get outta here. They crawl up there, but then they crawl up between the cloth and the plastic. Um, oh, yeah. You know, so then they can't get out. And then, so then we would come in. Pull 'em out from underneath the plastic, you know, get all their little measurements and then we'd, we'd put them all cuz they, they were social. I can't remember the speeches. I have to look cuz there were several different ones that we would, we would catch. Yeah. And it was, I mean, again, part of the reason why we were doing that as a census count. And so then we would, you know, and it was interesting because if we did. If we did catch different species, they were, they separated. They like segregated themselves. And so we would put like the bats that were all clumped together in a clump, put it in a little baggy, and then you would tie it either onto like your bra strap or I always had necklace, so I would tie it onto my necklace and put it in the top of my shirt, bag of bat. Just a little bag of bats. So that's against like my body heat as we're like walking back down because we would keep 'em then in a room and everything that was nice and warm for them during the day. Because they, again, they do get cold pretty quickly. And then we'd release them like as the sun's going down the next night, so, you know, so they could go out there and stuff like that. But the, it was, we were catching all the ones that were swoop. And catching bugs in mid-air because Yeah, that's as they're like finding their insects just flying right into the mist net and then Yeah, catch 'em up. Yeah. Yeah. So they were the aerial guys. Yep. So as I mentioned about, dividing them into two groups because of hibernation. So these micro batts can, they have two options for when it gets cold. As Katie said, you know, they lose body heat very quickly, which is important when you're flying. Cause you don't want it heat. It is, yeah. But, You could Cold Bath, you know when it's cold. Yeah. So you can either migrate and some baths. Do they leave the area or they hibernate? If they hibernate, they cannot hibernate for too long because they. Even though they're going into a state of toper where everything slows down, their metabolism, their heart, all of that, they're still burning so many calories and they're such a small animal that they really can't afford to burn too much, even though they fatten up before they go to sleep. They said they typically only go to sleep for a short amount of time unless they're in a very cold place. Then they go for longer, but it's riskier and a lot of times the bats don't stay asleep. The whole. They might wake up, get a quick snack and go back to sleep, but every time they wake up, it's extremely costly. Re research has shown that for each instance of disturbance from hibernation, a bat Meg spend up to 67 hibernation days of fat. So every time they wake up, they just lost 67 days of sleep. That's insane. Yeah. That's so crazy. Um, without enough fat to survive the winter. Bats might succumb to starvation or the cold. So it's very important to not disturb them. It has to be on their terms. They have to consent to losing those 67 days of sleep. I mean, I can't blame them either. Like you, how mad you'd be if somebody woke up. I would mad. Lost two months, two yeah. Months. And so that was, that was from an article where I got that from. But Wow. Fascinating. Yeah. So because they're, a lot of them are eating on the. These bats in particular heavily rely on Echo location. And everything I know about Echo location, I pretty much got from Magic School. I'm right. Um, it was a great episode. I highly recommend it if you wanna learn about Echo location or bats in general. You know, they're emitting these ultrasonic sounds that almost none of them human ears can hear. There's a couple of species that we can hear, but very few. Mm-hmm. They're making these noises and not just with their mouths. They can actually make them through their noses too, which I thought was, Mm-hmm. Um, so they make these sounds and then they're listening for the sound to bounce back to them. That bounce back tells them the size of the object, the speed the object is going, the direction it's in, and even the texture of the object. So am I looking at like a soft fuzzy? Yeah. Am I looking at a hard wall? Like, you know, so it does give them a sound picture essentially. And when they're hunting, they're making these sounds very, very quickly because they need instant feedback very quickly because whatever they're hunting is also trying to escape and it's changing direction. So when they're not, you know, when they're not actively hunting, they're just occasionally listening for echoes, but when they're hunting it's like, and you know, we've actually. I'm not surprised because I guess it'd be very hard for us to know, we can't hear it. So how would we know that bats are doing this? But the, unless you have an in a bath box, like an in a bath Well, right. Nowadays. Yeah. But so the first time that, the first instance of us knowing this was in 1940 mm-hmm. Was when echo location with baths was discovered. Hmm. Um, so I, I mean, yeah. And like I said, I'm not that surprised, but it is not that long ago. I guess with the whole like sonar thing, they were, we started finally being able to like, hear stuff. Another cool thing about bats and a lot of these insect war ones are hibernating. They can delay fertilization while they sleep, which they are the only mammal that can do that. There are other mammals that can delay implantation, so like egg is fertilized, they can just stop it from grow. Bats can just not let the egg get fertilized. They're just holding on until they wake up and then they let the whole magic happen. Which I guess saves the calories, you know? Yeah, no, not only is it not implanting and growing, but there is just no metabolism happening until they're ready for it, which is very convenient. And because, you know, as the insect eat, Most insects are flying around at night and they're coming out from undercover when it gets dark out. Mm-hmm. So the whole, like the reason why, there's a lot of reasons why bats are nocturnal, but one of the big ones is that's when their food comes out. Yep. And they are major predators of these night flying insects. They are known to be able to eat up to 3000 insects in one night like it is. Which is great. You're human control. Yes. Such good pest. Bats have been known to, not just mosquitoes, but like crop eating mos and things like that. Mm-hmm. Like seriously beneficial pest control. So I just wanted to highlight a couple of, uh, well, one in particular really cool micro bat, which is the Mexican free retail bat. Yes. That's in North America. It's got two records to its name, which is why I'm mentioning it. First of all, it is the fastest mammal clocking in at a hundred miles per hour. So, we all know cheetahs fastest land, mammal Mexican free tale pads are the fastest flying, and they're even cooler. Like, you know, peregrine falcons are really fast, but they're getting their speed when they dive Mexican free tailed bats. It's pure wing power, no diving involved. Mm-hmm. A hundred miles an hour of flapping. That's a mo. If you guys listen to our cryptozoology one, that's Moth Man. Fast. That's Moth Man. Fast. Not nearly as big, but Yeah. But as fast as Moth man. Um, yeah. And Mexican Free Out are the ones that we have here in Texas. Yes. And so that's the other thing, and particularly about Texas, they're other record mm-hmm. Is that they're found in the largest concentrations of any mam. In one text in Texas is Bracken Cave. Mm-hmm. You can find 15 to 20 million bats in one spot, which is wild. Yeah. Um, so, and I do know that they can, that bracken colony, I think it's something about like, it's estimated that they can consume over, I think it's like a hundred tons of moss every during the summer every night. Nice. A hundred. Tons like that. Absorb that for a second. I can't because malts ha we nothing. So yeah, there's no way. What? That's crazy. How can they bet a malts? Like how can they So wild man. It's so many sexy, so many moths. Yeah. So those were the insect war of the, of the micro bat. I'm not diving into this because it's, it would probably should be a whole nother episode, and that's like the outliers. I'm totally fine with doing another episode on bats. Oh, totally. Because these ones, I would really like to dive into some individual bats. Oh, absolutely. Because these guys are, you know, you've got your insect or eater, your fruit, you're insect eaters, your fruit eaters, and then the weirdos, and they're weird. They're still like micro batts, but they're the ones that are eating fish. It's like the greater bulldog. Frogs, lizards, mice, birds, and even other bats. Yeah. Okay. That's amazing. There's a bat I read about the ghost bat who's just dropping on prey from above and just eating a mice. That is wild. Yeah. And then of course you have the vampire bats. Only a few species that are that drink animal blood. And I was reading one where it was a scientist one time, saw a vampire bat mimicking a chick. It crawled up to a hen, I guess, making noises. And the hen wasn't even a little bit disturbed. She lifted her wing up for it to crawl underneath, and it just fed. In complete peace and then crawl Well, because whenever they feed, what's it called? Whenever they feed, they, they have like an anesthetic, right? Yeah. Yeah. So it does not hurt. Yeah. So they don't, they don't. But you know, just, oh yeah. Oh my baby, my gross little fury bouquet. And then just, she's a different color than all of 'em kind, you know, gravely just totally different. Come on under. Yeah. Um, so that was, that was micro bats quickly. But love 'em. And you know, they're, in the US we've got the most by far are the insect eaters. We've got a few of the fruit eaters mm-hmm. But not very many. So definitely what I'm most familiar with. Yeah. I've been down to Austin to see under Congress bridge, the huge colony that flies out. And that's pretty cool. But I, I know Bracken Cave is outside of San Antonio and. So desperately wanna make a trek down there. I just can't even imagine that many so bad in one place. Oh, I, I just lost 20 million. Oh million. Gosh. The, the, the smell. The smell alone. The guo. Yeah. I mean, I, I don't know how big the community colonies were that I saw whenever we were in Australia, but what I'm gonna talk about and what I, well, I saw a lot of in Australia were the fruit bats, the mega batts. Yeah. And that is a whole other thing. Cause there's one thing. Yeah. Cuz they're, I mean, tiny dogs and so, and they look like tiny dogs. And so that's, that was like a whole other thing to wrap your brain around cuz whenever I was up in far northeast Queensland in, in Cairns right along the ocean there. Like as soon as the sun starts setting, cuz they're in the trees. They're all day. Yeah. And then at night is when they start taking on like they're just flying dogs everywhere. Everywhere. And there's so much That's wild. Just so many of them, but they're huge. Yeah. And so like just wrapping your brain around, like those aren't birds, those are bats like. It's just, it was, it is so cool, but also just like, I don't know, I gotta get back to Australia to get like better videos and pictures and things like that. But anyway, so I'm gonna talk about the mega batts of fruit bats. They're generally larger than insect eating bats with a wingspan that ranges from six inches up to six feet, depending on the species. Their bodies are covered with fur that can range from brown to gray. And their wings are, like I said before, the thin members with a webbed structure that allows 'em to fly the long. Is fruit bats are distinguished by their large eyes and ears, which help them to navigate in the dark if they need to. Even fruit bats, like I know whenever I was down there farmers, they'll cover their fruit trees at night, like within netting and things like that to keep them all away, cuz they'll still go out at night and yeah, lunch on the fruit and everything. They have sharp little teeth. Which can you. Bite. I don't wanna say bite through mis nest cause that's why they have them all, but bite through like the skin of a lot of the tougher fruits want. Yeah. Um, and a lot of 'em have different tongues that are adapted to be able to pull out like nectar and juices and things like that from various fruits. Because a lot of 'em, they're not gonna sit there like munching on a peach, you know what I mean? Like with their two little like bat fingers. That'd love cute. That would be adorable. We need that drawn up. Yeah, I don't wanna watch the babies eat, like when they, on the, on TikTok videos when they're feeding bananas and their whole little mouth is just ra, like their cheeks are all full. If you want a good one to follow, shout out. It's Toga bat Hospital, T O L G A. It's in Queensland somewhere. I actually visited them whenever I was over there. Toga Bat Hospital. They do a lot of stuff and I'll talk a little bit about what they particularly focus on here in a little bit. But they post tons of content. A lot of it is fruit bats and just watching them eat, God, they're so cute. Yeah. Anyway. Fruit bouts are found in many tropical and subtropical regions around the world, including Africa, Asia, Australia, and the Pacific Islands. They typically roost in trees during the day and can be found in a variety of habitats, including the rainforest, savannahs coastal region. They're typically social animals that live in large colonies that can range in size from like a few individuals if need be, to tens of thousands. Yeah. I know you've got in the fruit eaters, there's those little, like tent making bats mm-hmm. That a few of them, but they all live in that little hou like tent. Mm-hmm. Like leaf house. Yeah, so cute. Cute. That's amazing. They use a variety of vocalizations and scent marking to communicate with each other and have been observed engaging in complex social behavior, such as sharing food and grooming each other, which I have seen both of those. Which again they're just like puppies that hang upside down. Fruit bats, they are primarily in nocturnal and spend much of their time foraging for food at. There are times, you know, it's not like they sleep all day. Right. You know, you kind of get that reputation. They definitely don't almost like, I don't know if you're a parent too. Yeah, yeah, exactly. Yeah. They kinda like nap and like little segments, so they're up during the day and so whenever we went to see a colony of bats, fruit bats during the day, you know, they're still moving around and stuff. It's not like they're. Hanging. They look like a bunch of hanging dead bats, right? Like they're removing, they're going to the bathroom they're doing stuff. But they are important. I mean, just like every other bat, they're important pollinators and sea dispersers for many plant species, particularly in tropical rainforest, where they help to maintain the health of pretty much the entire ecosystem. And there are, again, just like there are some insect species that only help to. Disperse certain trees and like that one species is heavily relied on. Same thing with bats. There are some species out there. Yep. There are some species out there that if those bats weren't around, that would not, that product that we get would not exist, which would be unfortunate for tequila. Like other varu bats are able to navigate in the dark using echolocation. So pause, timeout. It used to be, at least whenever we were younger, it used to be told that the tiny bats of micro batts use eco echolocation, larger bats, mega batts did not. That is now we found out incorrect. That makes sense. Why wouldn't you utilize it if you had the ob, the ability, you know what I mean? Yeah. Or obviously the fruit bats are using their sense of smell and sight. Yeah. What So sometimes are the little guys too. So, scientists used to think that overall fruit bats can't use sound to navigate, which again, is an ability that used to be only be known through micro batts. But a new study revealed that these bats can indeed echolocate, but instead of generating sounds with their larynx like a lot of them do, a lot of them use their wings by setting up a series of flying. Tasks, the scientists were able to determine if a fruit bat sound fake. Clinks clicks synced in their wing. Beats were useful in generating sonic maps to navigate in the dark. In one experiment, the animals were trained to discriminate between two large surfaces, a reflective board, and a white pe, and a piece of fabric and land on the board. When the lights were turned off, the bats completed the task and landed on the board, although rather clumsily like 70% of the time. Yeah, cuz they're still rying probably a lot on their eyes and stuff. Yeah, absolutely. Absolutely. The scientists also made the bats fly through a dark room strung with mazes of wire. Oh geez. Miss net. The fruit rats failed at this task repeatedly crashing into the. Which were a hundred times thicker than those of the other bat species were able to detect and avoid. I think it's like a normal bat would be able to, or the, like the micro guys would be able to detect a hu that a hundred times thicker. Thinner. Thinner. Yeah. So they were giving the, these guys, the bene, they were given a handicap benefit of the doubt. It could, they still can't. Yeah, still can't do it. The fruit bats shaky performance on the vision task indicate that although they do possess echolocation, theirs is more rudimentary version of what the micro batts is suggesting. That echolocation may have evolved and been lost many times throughout its evolution and past. Interesting. Yeah. So it may have started stop, started stop. I feel like it's how I navigate at. Haphazardly. Like, listen to see if I hear. Yeah. No, I don't. I, I think it'd be really cool to utilize echolocation more as humans. Some humans are really good at it. Yeah. Some have figured it out, but like I think it'd be wicked to like really be able to do it well. Yeah, that would be crazy. Just clicking through my house at night so I don't hit things. I run into things all the time. No, even in Even the daylight. Yeah. I run into crap. That's the, probably adhd, just not being like spatially aware of things, but like you run into nice. Have an extra hand. Right. So some other research though that's being done, and this was across all bats. There's a project that is studying bats in general, and it's a bat one project. This project aims to sequence the genomes of all 1400 living species of bats whoa looting fruit bats in order to better understand their evolution in ec. And again, just like everything else, that by studying the genetic differences between the bat species, researchers hope to gain insights into how bats have adapted different environments and develop unique biological features such as echolocation. Because again, yeah, because, yeah. Well, I was gonna say like understanding the evolution of where they're coming from as we're destroying their habitats. You know, we have to figure out, We need to kind of help them out in a way of, we gotta understand the past to figure out what we could be doing better for the future, sort of thing. Well, and it's also they're like one of the fastest evolving animal. Like they, they have found so many niches to fill. Oh, so many. Like, they are so quickly not evolving. Yeah. Yeah. Very, very quick. So that's just a little general information about the fruit bats and I wanna talk about a couple of the threats that are happening with. Now the reason why I was at Toba Hospital, what makes them unique is something that in that area there's a high rate of tick paralysis. And it's a, yeah, it's a very rare condition that occurs and a person can get it too. It just, because the bats are so tiny, it affects them more. And it's whenever they're bitten by certain species of ticks. These ticks really release toxin into the bloodstream and can cause a range of sys sy range of symptoms, including muscle weakness, numbness, and difficulty breath. In severe cases, tick paralysis can be fatal, poor now, and and often cases with bats, it's seen as being fatal because they end up falling to the ground. They can't move, you know, and then they become, preyed upon. So while tick, paralysis is typically associated with mammals such as dogs, cats, and humans, which is normally whenever you hear about it. It's often, especially in that region observed in, in bats and that's where like toga bat hospital comes in, cuz that's where a lot of, during tick season, they get a ton of calls for that. And then I mean they still do a lot of rescues with, you know, bats getting hung up in barb wire and stuff, but they get a lot of calls on bats, down bats because of tick paralysis. Hmm. And so they help nurse 'em back to health and, you know, help 'em get healthy, strong and then re-release. So another huge threat, which this is, you know, happening with all bats is just habitat stuff. Habitat destruction. Yeah. Yeah. Just, just everywhere. I mean, same thing like birds, I mean like para grand falcons. They've adapted that. Nice. Even the cities and stuff like that all the time. I mean, bats, they're not gonna be, they, they can be in the cities, but you're not. It's not like you're gonna see. Yeah. It's not ideal. And it's not like you're gonna see, you know, tons of co you know, huge colony. And now I say that and we have the one in Austin that's under the bridge. But even there like, but that's only because that's allowed, I mean, they could try and get rid of that colony. Yeah. Would a lot of places would try get rid of stuff like that. Yep. And they bat species, they rely on forest for roosting foraging and deforestation has just been a annihilating them. And like Lauren and I had talked about, I. Yes. Bat bats get a bad rap all the time. And that's been, you know, in the past with movies and things like that, I'm really waiting for bats to become like one of these you know how for a while it was like llamas and slots. So like the popular dude, I'm waiting, I'm so waiting for bats to hit. It's gotta hit eventually. Yeah. Um, um, I, it's just one of the nocturnal creatures always get a bad one because they do think we're afraid of the dark. Yeah. And then they. Totally different than us. Yeah. Even though we're pretty And they fly. Yeah, they fly. But we're still mammals together. So you, but a lot of people are afraid of rabies, although skunk, they're, you're more likely to get rabies from skunks and foxes than you are from backs. Oh, absolutely. Or like a, I feel like a dog. Cuz the, the chances. Okay. If there's no under no situ. Normal situation, should you be touching a bat. Like even if it's in, at your house, like if it's somehow in your house or whatever like that, open up a window, close the door, it'll fly out at night. Like it's going. It doesn't wanna be there. Although a lot of doctors now are saying like, if you have evidence of having had bats in your houses, you should just go get a rabies shot because it can bite you and you wouldn't know. I was like, okay. Yeah, but that's, that's, I. I mean, I, you know, err on the side of caution. Absolutely. But I don't know. I don't know the, the, I don't know. Yeah, rape bats are not, they're just, rabies doesn't happen as often, I think, as people think that it does. In there. No, in them as a species. And then, That's no land on people. Yeah. No. They're not actively landing in people's hair. They have back a location for a reason. They're trying to, yeah. To not do that. To not do that. We have bats multiple times in our houses. Our house's kids. Um, one flew Right. I had hanging curtains around my bed. Mm-hmm. And one flew right up over the curtain and smacked into the window trying to get out. Aw. Yeah. Scared the living daylights outta me. But I think they kept crawling in through like, I don't know, the dryer vent or something. Yep. Like some kind of little They kept getting in. Yeah. Yeah. And it doesn't take much for 'em to get in. But, but again, I mean, as we're destroying more and more of their force, they're trying to find a spot. Yeah. They're just trying to find a spot, figuring out how they can, survive and everything. And, and they are important, like we talked about the number of insect that a colony can eat in the night. Insane. I mean, right. Absolutely insane. Don't pest control for disease, for crops, annoyance. So many like tequila. Yeah. I mean, all the pollination that they do and the part, I mean that they're part of the food chain themselves for other things, eating. Mm-hmm. Yep. So that's root bats. So happy international bat day everybody. We hope you love bats a little bit more and you know, don't go out and hug a bat. I love that, you know, help spread the word. Appreciate them. This is the time of year where they're starting to wake up and flying around. Mm-hmm. I think I saw one just the other night. So right as the stunt starts to set, try and find an open area and look up and you might see some bats, trying to get some insects on the wing and. Just know that they're gonna do their thing and just appreciate them for doing it. And send me, if you can get pictures, send me pictures. I love back. I just really like that. They're just so cool. Yeah, they're really, really cool. All right guys, make sure you reach out to us on, on Twitter and Patreon. You can search for us four 11 nature, and then find us and support us if you can, so we can keep bringing you great content week after. Yep. And hopefully you know a little bit more, maybe even more than you wanted to, but that your curiosity is peaked and we hope to that you'll tune in next week. Bye everybody. Bye.