Which Mammals Fly in the Dark?
Bats are
the only mammals which can truly fly in the dark. They are
nocturnal and
so are active and fly at night. The wing of a bat is different from
the wing of a bird.
It is a skin-like membrane, the patagium, stretched between
enormously long arm
and hand
finger bones.
Most bats
are insectivorous while some are fruits-eating. The vampire bats
feed on
the blood of large mammals and some others feed on mice, voles, frogs
and fish.
Bats are able to find their prey and avoid obstacles in the dark by using a
sound radar
system called echolocation. They emit very high-pitched pulses of
sound called
ultrasound which cannot be heard by us. The sound waves bounce
back to
the bat after hitting an
object. The
bat hears the
patterns of
these echoes and
analyses it to
give a 'sound picture‘
of the
object and the surroundings.
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