the fruit bat

RT

Aug. 28. 2011

http://www.about-bats.com/graphics/bat-fruit-2.jpg

^ This link will show you a picture of a fruit bat eating fruit.

Fruit Bat

Like other bats, fruit bats, have very longed webbed fingers that act as wings. They have very good eyesight and sense of smell, unlike other bats. Fruit bats travel in groups called “camps”. Within these camps there is 1 male to 8 females. Like all bats, fruit bats are nocturnal, meaning they sleep during the day and go hunting at night. They hang upside down and cover themselves with their wings if they’re cold, and fan themselves when they’re hot. Fruit bats are perfect when it comes to flying, but they can’t really land that well. To stop they sometimes crash into a bush or tree, they fly by a tree hoping to hook onto the tree branch. if there is another fruit bat nearby when the crash land they start fighting. Did you know fruit bats are the smallest type of bats in the bat family?

Out of the 1100 species of bats, 70%eat insects and the others eat fruit. Can you guess what percentage the fruit bat lies under? The 30%! They suck on the flowers and fruit, and spit out the remaining pulp. Fruits that depend on the fruit bat are: bananas, peaches, dates, carob, avocados, jack fruit, plantains, mango, guava, cashews, figs, and durian. They sometimes feed of flowers, like sucking the nectar. If needed to, they have teeth so they can bite through tough skin on some fruits. Larger bats can eat whole fruit in one bite! Smaller bats fan their wings back and forth and tale tiny bites of fruit. Fruit bats fall under two types; Megabats and Microbats. Megabats are bigger in size and they have tiny eyes and small ear. Their eyesight is so strong they don’t have to use echolocation to find their food. These fed on fruit, nectar, and pollen. Microbats, however, are smaller with small eyes and big ears. Their eyesight inst as good as the Mega bat, so they have to rely on echolocation to find food. They live climates like rainforests because it is a dense forest. They are mostly found near the coast of Madagascar.

Deforestation is one of the main risk factors for these bats. It leaves them without a home, without food, and if they don’t have a home and don’t have food they’re going to die off, fruit bats are an endangered species. It also takes away their protection against violent island storms and cyclones. Storms not only ruin the population of fruit bats, it strips the fruit off of the trees making the food supply little to none.

Fruit bats reach sexual maturity when they are about two years old. They reproduce in the rainy season when the fruit is plentiful. It takes 150 days for the pup, baby fruit bat, grows, and when time comes, the female bat relies on gravity to help with the delivery. She hangs by her thumbs so she can use her hind legs to help the pup out. If the pup doesn’t cling on to her right away she turns upside down and catches it. The baby has “milk teeth” that allows to hang onto their mother and nurse while she is flying. At the age of 3 weeks the pup is too heavy so the mother leaves it behind whole she goes out and finds food. When the pup is 8 weeks old it starts flapping its wings to strengthen them. The mother shares her chewed up food with her pup, and by 7 months old, the pup is fully independent.