Macroglossus minimus or fruit bat is a very unique type of animal with many features. These bats aren’t very big so they live in places that help them survive. Their population is an average bat population. They live a good life with lots of food and with only one predator. But they have many competitors.

       

In its lifetime it will grow to around 65 to 85mm. Their tail can reach up to 5.18mm, but the kids tails are around 3.10 to 4.24mm. That is around 1mm shorter than adults. These bats can be described as a reddish-brown bat, with a light brown color on the abdomen, and a dark brown stripe that runs down the top of the head and all the way down the back. They are very good at adapting because they grew webbed fingers to fly and transport stuff, they have a good sense of smell to smell their food from great distances, because some people say they are blind, and they have a long mouth to dig in  flowers and fruit. You can identify this animal by seeing them eating flowers at night, you can see their webbed fingers, and they hang upside down when they sleep.

       

Macroglossus minimus spreads throughout the Philippines. These fruit bats make a living by hunting at night and sleep in dark places during the day, but sometimes when they really want to eat they have to travel far to find food. They do well in their habitat because they live in mostly dense forest’s where there is a lot of rain to grow enough vegetation for them to eat. They also do well because there are a lot of trees and good hiding spots to hide from predators.

       

This type of bat is a big specie. There are so many that scientists and biologists still can’t discover the population of this bat. This species isn’t  considered endangered because it is neither growing or dying, it is stable. That means their predators aren’t very good at killing them. One thing that changes the population is the precipitation level. If it rains they get food, but if it doesn’t rain they don’t get to eat as much.

       

They eat flowers and fruit at night in the Philippines, and during the day they sleep. The way they eat is by using their long mouth to put it into the flower and start licking around the inside, and that’s how they would eat. They are competing for food with many different fruit bats in the same habitat, but there is a lot of food for all the bats to eat, so they don’t fight that much.

       

My animal isn’t endangered because it only has one predator. That predator is humans. They have reasons why they do certain stuff just to avoid us. They hunt at night so if we try to get them, they can easily escape. They also hang upside down on high stuff or in caves so no one tries to catch them while they are sleeping.

       

While reading about my animal I learned many interesting facts about it. One fact that really stood out about my animal is its height and length. The tail can reach up to about 5mm, and it can reach up to 85 mm. I learned a lot about the Macroglossus minimus, I learned that they are nocturnal and that they have no predators except us humans. They also eat fruit and flowers.

       

As you can see the Macroglossus minimus species is a small bat that lives in a good habitat for it to survive in. Also, their population is stable because they live around a lot of food, but they have competitors which can take their food. You also learned that the reason they are not dying out is that they only have humans as predators.

 

Author: Damian

Published: 2/2011

Sources:

www.thewildones.ors/animals/fruitbat.html." Fruit Bats. Web. 4 Feb. 2011.

www.worldlingo.com/ma/enwiki/en/macroglossusminimus." Macroglossus Minimus. Web. 3 Feb. 2011.

"Long-tongued Nectar Bat." www.wikipedia.org/wiki/longtonguednectarbat. Wikipedia. Web. 3 Feb. 2011.

Northern Blossom Bat. Www.bathouses.com/northernblossumbat. Web. 3 Feb. 2011.