Benny
Egyptian Fruit Bat (Rousettus aegyptiacus)
About me
| Basic Info | Home: | I love to walk like an Egyptian.......although I'm dotted about the whole of Africa and the Middle East. In fact you can see a few of my buddies as far east as Pakistan and Northern India. Not a fan of the desert though, tend to avoid that crazy Sahara place. |
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| Size: | My body length's pretty small, only around 15cm but my wingspan is a mighty 60cm across! | |
| Favourite foods: | Fruit, fruit and more fruit – got to get that 5 a day in! Sweet, wild dates are yummy, in fact any kind of soft fruit, ripe or unripe is spot on. | |
| Environment: | Hooray for complete darkness! Caves rock (joke), as do trees – you can't beat a cave or a tree for some upside down chilling, the thousands of buddies I hang around with would definitely concur. | |
| Sounds like: | CLICK! CLICK! |
| Further Info |
Like most bats, Egyptian fruit bats use echolocation. The echolocation they use is special, however, because it is the only form of bat echolocation audible by the human ear. Normally, bats produce a high frequency sound, and wait for the echo to return to locate an object, in the larynx. Instead, their echolocation calls are made by releasing their tongues from the base of the mouth, resulting in a clicking sound. Fruit bats are ecologically important, helping to spread tropical seeds by passing them in their poo. The baobab tree, for instance, relies almost exclusively on fruit bats to pollinate its flowers. It is estimated that 70% of the world’s fruit is pollinated solely by bats. These bats are sometimes called dog bats because of their doglike faces. Flying foxes is also a common name given to them because, again, of their pointed ears and dog-like muzzle. |
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| Useful links |