Monday was International Bat Day! We know bats are not birds, but they do fly. They also serve many important ecological functions: They are the pollinators of more than 300 tropical fruits. Fruit eating bats have helped to restore diversity in rain forests. The insectivores will eat their body weight in insects each night. And bats are little fertilizer factories who produce guano, at times more precious than gold. There are more than 1300 species of bats around the world. They range in size from the flying fox with a wingspan of six feet, to the bumble bee bat which weighs as much as a penny. Let’s test your bat knowledge with a fun and fact filled true and false quiz, that also challenges some of the common myths about bats.
Our Outreach and Education Coordinator, Brian “Flying Fox” Ellis, a native of “Holy Toledo! Batman!” wrote this week’s quiz… with gratitude to these three sources:
https://www.wildlifeillinois.org/gallery/mammals/other-mammals/bats/
https://outdoor.wildlifeillinois.org/articles/of-bats-and-etymology/
https://commons.wikimedia.org/