lesser long-nosed bat
Leptonycteris yerbabuenaeSummary 1
The lesser long-nosed bat (Leptonycteris yerbabuenae) is a medium-sized bat found in Central and North America. It is sometimes known as Sanborn's long-nosed bat or the Mexican long-nosed bat, though the latter name is better avoided since it is also used for the entire genus Leptonycteris and for one of the other species in it, the greater long-nosed bat (L. nivalis).
Taxon biology 2
The lesser long-nosed bat is gray or yellow-brown above and reddish-brown below, with a short tail and small ears. It has a triangular shaped nose leaf, a projection of skin above the nostrils, which juts from the end of its nose. This species of bat is medium-sized and weighs less than 25 grams. It is 2.5 to 3 inches long and has a 14 inch wingspan. Juvenile lesser long-nosed bats have gray fur.
These bats eat nectar, pollen, and fruit and feed exclusively on night-blooming cacti, with columnar cactus flowers and fruits and agave flowers representing its core diet.
This species is found in southern Arizona and southwestern New Mexico south to western Mexico and Baja California del Sur. In 1988 these bats were listed as endangered under the Endangered Species Act.
Sources and Credits
- (c) Wikipedia, some rights reserved (CC BY-SA), http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Leptonycteris_yerbabuenae
- (c) National Biological Information Infrastructure (NBII) at http://www.nbii.gov, some rights reserved (CC BY-SA), http://eol.org/data_objects/13440363
