Ice gray bat
| Ice gray bat | ||||||||||||
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Ice gray bat ( Lasiurus cinereus ) |
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| Lasiurus cinereus | ||||||||||||
| ( Palisot de Beauvois , 1796) |
The ice-gray bat , also white-gray bat ( Lasiurus cinereus ), is a bat species from the smooth-nosed family (Vespertilionidae), which is native to North and South America.
The generic name Lasiurus is Greek and means "hairy tail". The species name cinereus is Latin and means "ash-gray".
description
The ice gray bat is a relatively large bat with a body weight of 20–35 g and an average total length of 134.5 mm. The females are slightly larger than the males. The ears are thick, short and round, and when placed forward do not reach the tip of the nose. The tragus is short and wide. The foot is half the length of the tibia and calcar . In contrast to other representatives of the genus Lasiurus , the ice gray bat does not have a reddish or yellow, but a dark brown fur. The hair is unusually long at 6.8 mm and has a white tip, which gives the species its name. The ice gray bat also has a white spot on the base of the thumb, elbows and shoulders. The tail fly skin and the outside of the ears are densely hairy with 3.3 mm long fur.
Way of life
Like most bats, the ice-gray bat is nocturnal and begins to search for food around 2 hours after sunset, usually after the main activity of the red bat . Regionally, however, the species only becomes active 5–6 hours after sunset. The dense, insulating fur allows the species to fly in cool temperatures down to a minimum of 0 ° C. In soaring flight it reaches a speed of over 20 km / h. The ice-gray bat is a moth specialist, but also eats beetles , grasshoppers , termites , dragonflies and wasps . Ice gray bats are usually solitary animals that hang in the foliage of trees 3–5 m above the ground during the day. It is assumed that the ice gray bat, like its sister species, the red bat , belong to the migrating bats. Nothing is known about the exact routes or alternative winter quarters for hibernation . In spring and autumn, however, larger groups were observed flying, which could indicate migration behavior.
Reproduction
As with many other bat species of the temperate latitudes, the mating of the ice gray bat takes place in autumn. The females store the sperm in their sexual organs through the winter. The ovulation takes place in April and May, after which the egg is fertilized by the stored sperm. In May to July, the females give birth to 1–4 young animals each, which are covered by fine gray hair. Eyes and ears are closed and only open after 12 or 3 days. From the age of about one month, the boys make their first attempts to fly. At night the young are left on the hanging place, but hang on to the mother during the day.
distribution
The ice gray bat occurs north of Canada , the United States , Mexico , and northern Honduras . In Central America the distribution area is limited to the western region of Panama . In South America the distribution area is in the north in central Colombia and the west of Venezuela , as well as east of the Andes on the edge of the Amazon basin from Peru to the central west coast of Brazil and in the south to central Argentina . Another distribution area is west of the Andes in central Chile . The IUCN has rated the species as harmless thanks to its widespread distribution and its occurrence in protected areas. The subspecies Lasiurus cinereus semotus is the only endemic bat in the Hawaiian Islands.
literature
- KA Shump Jr., AU Shump (1982): Lasiurus cinereus. In: Mammalian Species . No. 185, pp. 1-5.
