Vampire Bats Can Run!

Happy New Year ATS – here’s an interesting fact to start off 2015. I just discovered this and thought that some of you might like this article too.




Whilst researching an article for BBC Earth, writer Henry Nicholls came across an archived film of vampire bats running on a treadmill.

In a (sic) 2005, researchers described the common vampire bat’s remarkable gait in detail. At low speeds (up to 0.56 ms-1), the bats walked just like other four-legged mammals. But when the treadmill got faster, the vampires broke into “a unique bounding gait, in which the forelimbs instead of the hind limbs are recruited for force production as the wings are much more powerful than the legs.”

Apparently earlier studies have shown that they can run at up to speeds of 2m per second.

“The walking and hopping makes sense if they are to pursue ground-dwelling mammals for the blood meal,” says John Hermanson of Cornell University, the senior author of the study. Indeed, this is how the common vampire bat (Desmodus rotundus) typically sneaks up on the cattle and horses on which it commonly dines. The other two vampires (the white-winged vampire bat and the hairy-legged vampire bat) feed mainly off birds and are not such capable runners, he says. “We keep studying them!”

www.theguardian.com...

I'm quite fond of bats, but the thought of one sprinting along the ground is just a wee bit creepy!

Yeah, but can they run as fast as me?
More importantly, can they run faster than the person with me, but still not as fast as me?
BWHAHAHA

Seriously, seeing a bat running at you would be creepy as hell.

a reply to: DAVID64



It would be creepy as hell. Let's hope these ones don't run.

originally posted by: beansidhe
a reply to: DAVID64

It would be creepy as hell. Let's hope these ones don't run.

How big are they? The look damn huge

a reply to: aLLeKs

About one and half foot tall with a five foot wing-span!!!

Crikey.

Courtsey of Bat World- Bat Facts

originally posted by: beansidhe
a reply to: DAVID64

It would be creepy as hell. Let's hope these ones don't run.

Are you kidding me... tell me thats a really bad joke lol nah im good w bats the are a necessity to life its the rats i cant deal with!!

a reply to: beansidhe

Someone got mad about this thread

a reply to: ATF1886

Just checked, that type can only climb things - no running, thankfully! But still....quite creepy:



a reply to: Trueman

www.abovetopsecret.com...

I did a thread on Flying Foxes at one point. They look so human-like to me!! Bats are cool. Thanks, O.P. for that treadmill video.

a reply to: darkbake

I was in Pago Pago and saw a big group of them flying. My first thought was eagle of some kind. They were huge. The locals consider them a delicacy.

a reply to: darkbake

You are most welcome, darkbake. From your own excellent thread:



Perspective or not, that thing is HUGE!

I find bats incredibly creepy. Though in no way, shape or form wish to harm them. Just don't want them around me. Those ones are very alarming to see. And can't imagine having creatures of that size flying outside at night. I take the large ones are just unusual giants in their species, rather than a sub species?

a reply to: beansidhe
Cool vid!
Sort of reminds me of a frog hopping along.
Quite weird.
I have hundreds of small bats in my roof-they are protected over here so I couldn't get rid of them even I they bothered me.
Luckily I like them,and once went in the loft before dawn in the summer,to see them all return to sleep the day away.
That was cool.

I have also seen swarms of thousands of those massive fruit bats in SE Asia-alot of construction sites are 24hour over there,and fruit bats would flock in their 1000's around the bright lights,gobbling up the insects.
Looked and sounded pretty freaky the first time I saw that-like something out of "Dracula."

originally posted by: beansidhe
a reply to: DAVID64

It would be creepy as hell. Let's hope these ones don't run.

or this one...2.bp.blogspot.com...

a reply to: Unity_99

No, no, they are just a sub-species, terrifying as that may be! That's the size they get to. Thankfully only vampire bats can run -quite fast, though - but they're tiny wee.


Type: Mammal
Diet: Carnivore
Average life span in the wild: About 9 years
Size: Body, 3.5 in (9 cm); wingspan, 7 in (18 cm)
Weight: 2 oz (57 g) (Varies; can double in one feeding.)
Group name: Colony
Size relative to a tea cup:



animals.nationalgeographic.com...

a reply to: beansidhe

Or that guy is really small ?
But I don't think these bats are really dangerous and living in our region.
I knew that vampire bats sneak up to seals and drink their blood or more like licking blood from wounds.

a reply to: Silcone Synapse

I loved that video, I've never seen anything like it!
It must be a breath-taking sight seeing a group of fruit bats flying, but yes, pretty freaky at the same time.

a reply to: haven123

Sweet child of mine! That is some bat! But it looks cruel, they've strung it up after it died. Poor bat.

a reply to: 0bserver1


He could be tiny!

I didn't know that they crept about the ground, I thought they mainly flew. From the Bat Facts page earlier, it says they live in South America and Central America. Not so great if you live there, but fine for creeped-out people in Scottish-land, like myself!

a reply to: beansidhe
I forgot to mention a few of my other bat experiences-
One was when there was a city person out in the wild for the first time,when the bats started flying about at dusk,city boy freaked out and ran about shouting:
"Who's poking me,who's tapping on my chest/arms/legs?"

It was the bats,pinging him with sonar!


We calmed him down eventually,but he thought there was a ghost poking at him.
No Joke!But funny.

I have also had a sort of Indiana Jones/Tomb Raider experience,when going into a cave system on the island of Borneo.
I felt lots of sonar pings,like rain hitting you in the cave then-BOOM,hundreds of bats fly past to get out of the cave.
That was awesome,even though some others on my team were screaming and thrashing about like eejuts.
I just kept still,knowing bats don't want to fly into us humans,they are just looking for bugs to eat..

a reply to: beansidhe

Well count me in too .. I wouldn't want to wake up with some bloodsucking running bat chasing me trough the house..although he the size I probably would splat the little bugger underneath my size 42 boots