![]() ![]() The mother carries the pup for the first few days of life. After a gestation of 205-214 days, females give birth to a single pup weighing about two-tenths of an ounce (5-7 g) twins are rare. Mating occurs year round, and pregnant bats roost together in a nursery group. Vampire bats are sexually mature at nine months of age. Bats will even share blood with other colony members who weren’t successful at finding prey. Bats spend hours grooming themselves and social grooming usually takes place between closely related females, or females and their young. Within the colonies there are subgroups consisting of breeding males with around twenty females and their offspring. Social Organizationīats are very social animals living in colonies of hundreds or even thousands of bats. In the wild: Blood from domestic animals such as cows, donkeys, pigs and horses.Įagles, owls and hawks prey on the vampire bat. They have a short rounded muzzle, large ears, and a thumb claw on the front of the wing.They have an eight-inch (20 cm) wingspan.They have a grizzled, gray-brown, furry coat.They weigh one-half to one-and-a-half ounces (15-45 g).The vampire bat’s head and body length is two to three inches (6.5-9 cm).The muscle fibers extend the wings and provide tension as the bats flap their wings in flight, then fold the wings in when they rest. Bats have a thin membrane of skin with bundles of elastic tissue and muscle fiber that is supported by the finger bones and extends to the arms and legs. The wings of bats are different than birds, as a result bats are the only mammals capable of sustained flight. Vampire bats also have very good hearing, excellent vision and a well-developed sense of smell, all of which aid in finding food. Echolocation is the ability to bounce these sound waves off objects so the returning sound waves provide information about food sources and potential hazards. Bats produce ultrasonic (high frequency) sounds that are not audible to humans. In the darkness, they use echolocation to find food and to avoid collisions when flying. Ultrasonic NavigationĬommon vampire bats are active only during the darkest hours of the night. With such a huge increase in body weight, vampire bats would not be able to fly after a meal if it were not for their ability to rapidly process and digest the blood. A vampire bat may ingest up to 40 percent of its body weight while feeding. They do not suck blood but rather use their grooved tongue to lap up the free-flowing blood. Their saliva contains an anti-coagulant called “draculin” that keeps blood flowing from the wound. After landing on or near a potential food source, they use their razor sharp incisors to make a tiny, painless cut in the skin of the animal. Vampire bats feed almost exclusively on blood from domestic animals. ![]()
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