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The world's smallest mammal is the bumblebee bat of Thailand, weighing
less than a penny
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Giant flying foxes that live in Indonesia have wingspans of nearly
six feet
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The common little brown bat of North America is the world's longest
lived mammal for its size, with life-spans sometimes exceeding 32 years
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Mexican free-tailed bats sometimes fly up to two miles high to feed
or to catch tail-winds that carry them over long distances at speeds of more
than 60 miles per hour
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The pallid bat of western North America is immune to the stings of
scorpions and even the seven-inch centipedes upon which it feeds
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Fishing bats have echolocation so sophisticated that they can detect
a minnow's fin as fine as a human hair, protruding only two millimeters above
a pond's surface
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African heart-nosed bats can hear the footsteps of a beetle walking
on sand from a distance of more than six feet
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Red bats that live in tree foliage throughout most of North America
can withstand body temperatures as low as 23 degrees F. during winter hibernation
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Tiny woolly bats in West Africa live in the large webs of colonial
spiders
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The Honduran white bat is snow white with a yellow nose and ears.
It cuts large leaves to make "tents" that protect its small colonies
from jungle rains
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Disk-winged bats of Latin America have adhesive disks on both wings
and feet that enable them to live in unfurling banana leaves
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Frog-eating bats identify edible from poisonous frogs by listening
to the mating calls of male frogs. Frogs counter by hiding and using short,
difficult to locate calls
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Vampire bats adopt orphans and have been known to risk their lives
to share food with less fortunate roost-mates
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Mother Mexican free-tailed bats find and nurse their own young, even
in huge colonies where many millions of babies cluster at up to 500 per square
foot
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Nearly 1,000 kinds of bats
account for almost a quarter of all mammal species, and most are highly beneficial
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Worldwide, bats are important
natural enemies of night-flying insects
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A single little brown bat
can catch 1,200 mosquitoes-sized insects in just one hour
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A colony of 150 big brown
bats can protect local farmers from up to 33 million or more rootworms each
summer
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The 20 million Mexican
free-tails from Bracken Cave, Texas eat approximately 200 tons of insects
nightly
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Tropical bats are key elements
in rain forest ecosystems that rely on them to pollinate flowers and disperse
seeds for countless trees and shrubs
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In the wild, important
agricultural plants, from bananas, breadfruit and mangoes to cashews, dates,
and figs rely on bats for pollination and seed dispersal
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Desert ecosystems rely
on nectar-feeding bats as primary pollinators of giant cacti, including the
famous organ pipe and saguaro of Arizona
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Bat droppings in caves
support whole ecosystems of unique organisms, including bacteria useful in
detoxifying wastes, improving detergents, and producing gasohol and antibiotics
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An anticoagulant from vampire
bat saliva may soon be used to treat human heart patients
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Contrary to popular misconception,
bats are not blind, do not become entangled in human hair, and seldom transmit
disease to other animals or humans
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All mammals can contract
rabies; however, even the less than a half of one percent of bats that do,
normally bite only in self-defense and pose little threat to people who do
not handle them
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Bats are exceptionally
vulnerable to extinction, in part because they are the slowest reproducing
mammals on earth for their size, most producing only one young annually
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More than 50% of American
bat species are in severe decline or already listed as endangered. Losses
are occurring at alarming rates worldwide
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Lots of bats increases
demand for chemical pesticides, can jeopardize whole ecosystems of other animal
and plant species, and can harm human economies