Tricolored Bat (Perimyotis subflavus)

Taxonomy with any species can get confusing, but it can be really challenging when one species is reclassified into another. There are usually excellent reasons for doing so which typically involve a close genetic study of the animal that reveals new information about its lineage and interrelatedness to other species.


Case in point: Tricolored bat (Perimyotis subflavus) formerly the eastern pipistrelle (Pipistrellus subflavus). Most everyone I know still calls these little bats "the Eastern pip".

To quote wikipedia: Although traditionally considered a member of the genus Pipistrellus, a growing body of evidence suggests that the Eastern Pipistrelle is only distantly related to the pipistrelles proper. Hoofer and Van Den Bussche (2003) found the Pipistrellini (containing Pipistrellus s.s., Nyctalus, and Scotoecus) sister to the Vespertillionini. Both the Eastern and Western Pipistrelle were outside of this clade. They suggest that the Eastern Pipistrelle be removed from the genus Pipistrellus and placed in its own genus, Perimyotis.


And thus it was



Tricolored Bat (Perimyotis subflavus)



Tricolored Bat (Perimyotis subflavus)



Tricolored Bat (Perimyotis subflavus)


Jerry Coyne writes about the species classification debate with a post about elephants here: http://whyevolutionistrue.wordpress.com/2011/01/02/how-many-species-of-elephant/

Spotted Bat (Euderma maculatum)

I have posted this species before - but this is another excellent example of a bat that does not fit the "brown or gray" category. The spotted bat is one of the most unique bats in North America, partly because of its huge ears, but also because of the three white spots on its back, and furry white underside.


They are rarely seen.



Spotted Bat (Euderma maculatum)



Spotted Bat (Euderma maculatum)



Spotted Bat (Euderma maculatum)



Spotted Bat (Euderma maculatum)



Spotted Bat (Euderma maculatum)

Southeastern Myotis (Myotis austroriparius)

When people hear that I work with bats frequently, they usually assume that I have to go into a lot of caves. And while bats are often cave dwellers, they are also at home in a variety of other habitats. 


For instance, below a southeastern myotis emerges from a tree hollow in Central Texas at dusk.



Southeastern Myotis (Myotis austroriparius) emerging from tree hollow



Southeastern Myotis (Myotis austroriparius) detail


Bats are usually content to find a tiny place they can squeeze into, where southern exposure keeps the environment warm and they feel safe.



Southeastern Myotis (Myotis austroriparius)

Red Ichneumon Wasp (Ichneumonidae)

These small, delicate wasps are typically nocturnal and can often be seen around street lamps or other lights. This photograph resulted from an experiment in which the camera automatically recorded whatever came into range on a warm Texas evening. It appears very alien to me, and I love the body attitude as it flies toward the camera.



red Ichneumon Wasp (Ichneumonidae)

Seminole Bat (Lasiurus seminolus)

With the wonderful help of Leigh Stuemke, I went out into the wilderness of East Texas and photographed seminole bats. Like so many bats, there are many mysteries about the life habits of seminole bats, but they are beautiful animals with striking features.





It was a warm and humid evening with fireflies and frogs. A cottonmouth was curled up next to the pond where we set-up the gear. This was only a few days after hurricane Ike devastated Galveston, and we had to navigate around downed trees to make our way into the Stephen F Austin Experimental forest.

I can only wonder how such a small creature could survive a monster storm, tucked into some small crevice, or under the bark of a swaying tree.



Bats are quick and lovely, and I never fail to be amazed by them.

Silver-haired bat (Lasionycteris noctivagans)

I have worked with many different species of bats through the years and there are some species that can be challenging to distinguish from one another. Primarily, the small myotis species can look very similar - however, as I spend more time with bats it becomes clear that most are uniquely interesting (such as my favorite the spotted bat). One such bat is the silver-haired bat:


Silver-haired bat (Lasionycteris noctivagans)

Their name is derived from the frosty patch of pelage that runs along their back. There can be considerable variation in adult fur color and the "silver hair" is most visible in the darker individuals.


Silver-haired bat (Lasionycteris noctivagans)

I have come across these bats on many occasions, but have found it frustrating to try and get good images of them. Mostly, I think, its their contrarian personality. When I try to get portraits they fly away. When I try to get flight shots, they decide to remain on their perch. No other bat has ever given me such a difficult challenge when trying to get images.

Yet they have a lot of personality - and an expressive face.


Silver-haired bat (Lasionycteris noctivagans)


Silver-haired bat (Lasionycteris noctivagans)

I finally found a silver-haired bat that was a willing subject - thanks to Barb Ogaard, a bat specialist and rehabilitator. This little bat was a fat, happy, and just getting out of rehab. And she was more than willing to exercise her wings in preparation for her upcoming release back into the wild.

Silver-haired bat (Lasionycteris noctivagans)

Finding Bats

Bats are not easy to find. They spend their nights in the air hunting for insects, and as day approaches they will find the most inaccessible places to wedge themselves into. For many species, this day time roost might be in a new spot every day. This is a problem if you want to study bats, and biologists are finding a variety of creative ways to locate bats.

Enter the Bat Dog.



CJ, a chocolate lab working as a trained wildlife detector dog, tries to find bat roosting sites along with his handler, wildlife technician Elisabeth Mering in the Coconino National Forest in Arizona. Note the gps unit that will track CJ's evey move.



Once CJ detects the sent of bat guano, he will alert.



Here, tucked under the bark of a dead ponderosa tree is a maternity colony of allen's lappet-browed bats. It looks like chaos, but there are about 17 bats crammed together in this tiny spot.



As night falls, they slowly pop out from under the bark and head out into the night.



Little is known about this rare species.

A Rare And Extraordinary Creature – Euderma maculatum, spotted bat

Years ago I heard a biologist describe an encounter they had with a spotted bat, and I remember how impressed I was by the sense of wonder and awe that I heard in that description. Perhaps it is necessary to spend one's professional life in the study of bats to get a sense of the mythical status surrounding these creatures, but I was immediately impressed with the description, and how unique and rare the spotted bat is among bats.

Spotted bats were once considered to be the rarest of North American mammals. Up until the 1990's very few had ever been collected, and most of these were dead or mummified remains. A few live spotted bats were seen, one at the entrance to a cave. However, it turns out that spotted bats are one of the few bats who's echolocation call can be easily heard by the human ear. Once this fact was discovered, biologists eventually found that, while they are still not a common species, they can be detected in many habitats where their presence was completely unknown before.

They fly high and fast in the darkest hours of the night, and they have an uncanny ability to avoid being captured using specialized techniques commonly employed by biologists who study bats. To this day, capturing one is still a rare event, and there are bat biologists who, despite years in the field, have never seen one.

I am still slightly stunned that I was along when a graduate student, working near the rim of the Grand Canyon in Arizona, caught four spotted bats over the course of two nights - even though he was trying to capture an entirely different species. This gave me a unique opportunity to get some detailed photographs of the the bat.


spotted bat (Euderma maculatum)

Below you can see the pattern of three distinctive spots that give the bat its name.


spotted bat (Euderma maculatum)


spotted bat (Euderma maculatum)

A photograph cannot really show the amazing amount of character these bats have.


spotted bat (Euderma maculatum)

Bats are still largely mysterious creatures - many of their habits and roosting sites remain completely unknown. However, technology is just now giving biologists the ability to use miniature transmitters to track these tiny mammals. The female bat, seen in these images, was lactating - meaning that she had a pup hidden away somewhere. Because this capture presented a rare opportunity to track a mother spotted bat, she was outfitted with a transmitter and set free (the transmitter will fall off after a few days).

The next day a plane was chartered, and Grand Canyon National Park gave special permission to fly into the Canyon with radio telemetry gear to see if the day roost of this bat could be located. After many hours of searching, the bat's location was detected, 17 miles from the capture site the night before, in a crevice in one of the sheer cliff walls of the Grand Canyon. Presumably, she returned to nurse her young pup after a night of hunting insects in the warm Arizona night.