Hi Folks,

Well because we missed a day last week due to the weather, we decided to run the traps last night, the 6th March. It was cloudy and thundery for a while, but it didn’t rain until after midnight, and we got about 23.8 mm of rain. We set traps KL0379, KL0381, KL0383, KL0385, KL0387, KL0389, KL0391, KL0393, KL0395, KL0499, KL0507 and KL0509.

It was actually a really good night for us, with three species that we have not yet caught this year, and another Nycteris tragata. First off we had the fruit bat Cynopterus horsfieldii which looks very like Cynopterus brachyotis only quite a bit larger with a forearm ranging 70-78 mm and weight 43-65 g, compared to 55-66 mm and 28-40 g in C. brachyotis.

Hipposideros cineraceus

We also caught Hipposideros cineraceus which looks a bit like Hipposideros bicolor 142 kHz, but is smaller, with forearm ranging 36-41 mm and weight 4-6 g. There is also a subtle difference in the noseleaf shape, especially the internarial septum — the bit of skin and cartilage that separates the nostrils. There’s a teeny tiny bump on this bit of skin in H. cineraceus and not on either of the bicolor bats. Unfortunately, we were looking at it so closely that it bit Ain, who jumped a bit and I ended up letting the bat go! It did a few laps of the lab before escaping out into the night. So that was a bit annoying, but fortunately we got the data first!

Myotis muricola is a member of the Vespertilionidae family, like the Kerivoula, Phoniscus and Murina. We don’t catch it very often in the harp traps because it tends to forage in tree fall gaps and edges of vegetation, and not in the dense understory. The genus Myotis is found around much of the world. In Texas we have at least seven species (possibly nine) of Myotis. To get the full list and learn more you can go to Mammals of Texas – Online Edition

Myotis muricola

So on to the data: