Bats

The order Chiroptera (meaning "hand wing") contains the only true flying mammals: bats. The entire bat skeleton, especially the limbs, is modified for flight. The wings are formed from elongated finger bones (except for the thumb, which has a claw) and they are covered by flight membranes, extensions of the body's skin, which often extend between leg and tail.

Almost all bats are nocturnal, with some species flying up to 56 miles (90 km) each night between their feeding grounds and the caves or roosts where they sleep by day. They have good vision, but most make their way through the dark night sky with the aid of sonar or echolocation (see Echolocation).

There are more than 925 known species of bats, making this the second-largest mammalian order. It is divided into two suborders: Megachiroptera (large bats), which has only one family, Pteropodidae; and Microchiroptera (small bats), which contains the remaining sixteen families.

Most of the 166 species of pteropids are fruit-eaters; the rest feed on nectar and pollen. They can often be recognized by their large eyes and pointed face, which have earned some of them the name "flying foxes."

Mostly small with tiny eyes—as their name suggests—the microchiropterans are mainly insectivores, although there are several notable exceptions. For example, the very large family of leaf-nosed bats, Phyllostomidae, includes many fruit-eating species as well as three species of vampire bats, which feed exclusively on the blood of birds and large mammals; and the fishing bat (Myotis vivesi), true to its name, eats fish.

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