Animal Diversity Web

Ge­o­graphic Range

Lit­tle brown bats, My­otis lu­cifu­gus, are abun­dant in south­ern Alaska, Canada, across the United States from the Pa­cific to At­lantic coasts, and the higher el­e­va­tion forested re­gions of Mex­ico. Al­though lit­tle brown bats are not found in north­ern Canada, in­di­vid­u­als have been ob­served in Ice­land and Kam­chatka. Those out­ly­ing records are pre­sumed to have been the re­sult of ac­ci­den­tal ship trans­porta­tion by hu­mans. Lit­tle brown bats are also ab­sent from much of Florida, the south­ern Great Plains re­gions of the U.S., south­ern Cal­i­for­nia, and parts of coast Vir­ginia and the Car­oli­nas. (Bar­bour and Davis, 1969; Fen­ton and Bar­clay, 1980; Nowak, 1994)

• Biogeographic Regions
• nearctic
  • native

Habi­tat

My­otis lu­cifu­gus oc­cu­pies three types of roosts: day, night, and hi­ber­na­tion roosts. Lo­ca­tions of roosts are cho­sen based upon the pres­ence of sta­ble am­bi­ent tem­per­a­tures. Day and night roosts are used by ac­tive bats and in­clude, but are not lim­ited to, build­ings, trees, under rocks, and in piles of wood. Day roosts have very lit­tle or no light, pro­vide good shel­ter, and typ­i­cally have south­west­ern ex­po­sures to pro­vide heat for arousal from daily tor­por.

Night roosts are se­lected for their con­fined spaces where large con­cen­tra­tions of bats can clus­ter to­gether to in­crease the tem­per­a­ture in the roost. These roosts are pri­mar­ily oc­cu­pied when tem­per­a­tures are below 15°C. Night roosts are usu­ally away from day roosts; this may di­min­ish the ac­cu­mu­la­tion of feces at day roosts and avoid sig­nal­ing preda­tors. Day and night roosts are in­hab­ited dur­ing spring, sum­mer, and fall months, whereas dur­ing the win­ter, hi­ber­nac­ula sites are used.

Nurs­ery roosts are sim­i­lar to day roosts but are warmer than am­bi­ent tem­per­a­ture. They are usu­ally oc­cu­pied only by fe­males and their off­spring. Fe­males use the same nurs­ery colony every year.

Hi­ber­nac­u­lum sites may be shared with My­otis yu­ma­nen­sis. These sites usu­ally in­clude aban­doned mines or caves where the tem­per­a­ture is con­tin­u­ously above freez­ing and hu­mid­ity is high. North­ern pop­u­la­tions of bats enter hi­ber­na­tion in early Sep­tem­ber and end in mid-May; south­ern pop­u­la­tions enter in No­vem­ber and end their hi­ber­na­tion in mid-March. My­otis lu­cifu­gus does not make tremen­dously long mi­gra­tions dur­ing the change of sea­sons. (Wil­son and Ruff, 1999; Fen­ton and Bar­clay, 1980; Koop­man and Gud­munds­son, 1966; Nowak, 1994; Wil­son and Ruff, 1999)

My­otis lu­cifu­gus in­hab­its forested lands near water, but some sub­species can be found in dry cli­mates where water is not read­ily avail­able. In those habi­tats, drink­ing water is pro­vided by mois­ture on cave walls or con­den­sa­tion on the fur. Lit­tle brown bats live over a wide lat­i­tu­di­nal and el­e­va­tional range. (Bar­bour and Davis, 1969; Fen­ton and Bar­clay, 1980; Tut­tle, 1991; Wil­son and Ruff, 1999)

• Habitat Regions
• temperate
• terrestrial

• Terrestrial Biomes
• desert or dune
• savanna or grassland
• chaparral
• forest
• mountains

• Other Habitat Features
• urban
• suburban
• agricultural
• riparian
• caves

Phys­i­cal De­scrip­tion

The fur of M. lu­cifu­gus is glossy, and varies in color from dark brown, golden brown, red­dish, to olive brown. Al­bino in­di­vid­u­als have also been ob­served. The ven­tral side has lighter pelage. The wing and in­ter­femoral mem­branes are nearly hair­less and dark brown or black. The tra­gus is blunt and of medium height. Their ears usu­ally do not ex­tend past the nose when laid for­ward. My­otis lu­cifu­gus has small ears and large hind feet. The fore and hind limbs have five metapo­di­als. The hind foot has hairs that ex­tend past the toes.

The skull has some dis­tin­guish­ing char­ac­ter­is­tics. My­otis lu­cifu­gus lacks a sag­gi­tal crest, has a short­ened ros­trum, 38 teeth, and a up­s­lope pro­file of the fore­head. In ad­di­tion, the brain­case is flat­tened and sub­cir­cu­lar when ob­served dor­sally.

My­otis lu­cifu­gus does not pos­sess a keel on the cal­car and has a short tibia rel­a­tive to the length of the hind foot (~55% of the tib­ial length). My­otis lu­cifu­gus lacks choroidal papil­lae and folded reti­nas, and there­fore does not ex­hibit eye shine. (Nowak, 1994; Nowak, 1994; Fen­ton and Bar­clay, 1980; Kurta, 1995; Nowak, 1994)

My­otis lu­cifu­gus weighs be­tween 5 and 14 g. The length varies be­tween 60 and 102 mm, and the wingspan be­tween 222 and 269 mm. The fore­arm, in­clud­ing claw, mea­sures 33 to 41 mm, and tail length mea­sures 28 to 65 mm. The hind foot is be­tween 8 and 10 mm in length, ears are 11 to 15.5 mm, and the tra­gus is 7 to 9 mm. Lit­tle brown bats fly at speeds as high as 35 km/hour and av­er­age 20 km/hour. Fe­males are larger than males, es­pe­cially dur­ing the win­ter. (Fen­ton and Bar­clay, 1980; Nowak, 1994; Wil­son and Ruff, 1999)

• Other Physical Features
• endothermic
• heterothermic
• bilateral symmetry

• Sexual Dimorphism
• female larger

• Range mass

  5 to 14 g

  0.18 to 0.49 oz

• Range length

  60 to 102 mm

  2.36 to 4.02 in

• Average length

  87 mm

  3.43 in

• Range wingspan

  222 to 269 mm

  8.74 to 10.59 in

• Average basal metabolic rate

  0.051 W

  AnAge

Re­pro­duc­tion

Mat­ing oc­curs be­tween adult fe­males and adult males; subadult males are not sex­u­ally ma­ture until after their first year. Mat­ing oc­curs in two phases: ac­tive and pas­sive. Dur­ing the ac­tive phase, both part­ners are awake and alert. In the pas­sive phase, ac­tive males mate with tor­pid in­di­vid­u­als of both sexes; pas­sive phase mat­ing is ap­prox­i­mately 35% ho­mo­sex­ual. Mat­ing is ran­dom and promis­cu­ous. Fe­males in ac­tive phase usu­ally mate with more than one male. In both ac­tive and pas­sive phase mat­ings, males mate with mul­ti­ple fe­males. (Fen­ton and Bar­clay, 1980; Wai-Ping and Fen­ton, 1988)

• Mating System
• polygynandrous (promiscuous)

Swarm­ing at the hi­ber­nac­ula oc­curs dur­ing late sum­mer and fall; ac­tiv­ity de­creases with lower tem­per­a­tures. Swarm­ing serves a prenup­tial func­tion, along with show­ing the young suit­able hi­ber­na­tion roosts. Dur­ing late July, bats ar­riv­ing at the hi­ber­nac­ula are adult males and non­parous fe­males; fe­males and subadults ap­pear in early Au­gust. Swarm­ing M. lu­cifu­gus may travel large dis­tances, caus­ing mix­ing of pop­u­la­tions from dif­fer­ent areas. Dur­ing the swarm­ing pe­riod, lit­tle brown bats are re­cep­tive to calls of con­specifics. (Fen­ton and Bar­clay, 1980; Schowal­ter, 1980)

My­otis lu­cifu­gus has en­larged pararhi­nal glands dur­ing the mat­ing sea­son. Mat­ing oc­curs when a male mounts a fe­male from the rear. The male may bite the fe­male on her back. Upon fe­male strug­gle, the male may emit a cop­u­la­tion call to ease the fe­male. Males in­sem­i­nate fe­males that are are ac­tive as well as those that are tor­pid. Lit­tle brown bats delay ovu­la­tion and store sperm for about seven months be­tween cop­u­la­tions in the fall and fer­til­iza­tion in the spring. Pups are born and reared in June and July after a 50 to 60 day ges­ta­tion pe­riod. The great­est en­ergy de­mand on fe­males oc­curs dur­ing lac­ta­tion and to­ward the end of preg­nancy. Fe­males lose the abil­ity to ther­moreg­u­late well when ap­proach­ing par­tu­ri­tion. (Fen­ton and Bar­clay, 1980; Wai-Ping and Fen­ton, 1988)

Nor­mally, bats hang head down; fe­males giv­ing birth re­verse their po­si­tion, so their head is up. Young are born into the in­ter­femoral mem­brane; only one young is born per year. The pups’ eyes and ears open within hours of birth, and de­cid­u­ous teeth are fully erupted. Pups must cling to the fe­male’s nip­ple using their de­cid­u­ous in­cisors, large thumbs, and hind feet. The young start hear­ing at day 2 and de­velop au­di­tory sen­si­tiv­ity sim­i­lar to that of an adult by day 13. On ap­prox­i­mately day 9.5, pups are able to ther­moreg­u­late and in three weeks they are able to fly.

In­de­pen­dence from the mother comes when the pups start to fly and be­come self-sup­port­ing at about 4 weeks of age. Adult weight is at­tained at about 4 weeks of age as well. Sper­mato­ge­n­e­sis starts in May and ends in Au­gust. (Fen­ton and Bar­clay, 1980)

• Key Reproductive Features
• iteroparous
• seasonal breeding
• gonochoric/gonochoristic/dioecious (sexes separate)
• sexual
• fertilization
• viviparous
• sperm-storing
• delayed fertilization

• Breeding interval

  Both sexes mate more than once per year and produce one young per year.

• Breeding season

  Mating begins in mid-August during the active phase and continues in passive phase throughout the winter.

• Range number of offspring

  1 to 2

• Average number of offspring

  1

• Average number of offspring

  1

  AnAge

• Range gestation period

  50 to 60 days

• Range weaning age

  21 to 28 days

• Average weaning age

  26 days

• Average time to independence

  4 weeks

• Average age at sexual or reproductive maturity (female)

  210 days

• Average age at sexual or reproductive maturity (female)
  Sex: female

  210 days

  AnAge

• Average age at sexual or reproductive maturity (male)

  210 days

• Average age at sexual or reproductive maturity (male)
  Sex: male

  210 days

  AnAge

Moth­ers nurse their own young and dis­tin­guish from other pups by odor and calls. For 18 to 21 days, pups in­gest only milk from their mother. Wean­ing takes place at about three weeks; at this time, the per­ma­nent teeth fully erupt and pups start to feed on in­sects along with the mother's milk. After wean­ing, the pups have a drop in body weight as they learn to catch in­sects. It is not clear if moth­ers bring in­sects to their young or help to teach them to hunt. How­ever, many fe­male/young pairs are cap­tured to­gether, sug­gest­ing that there is some pe­riod of su­per­vised learn­ing be­fore in­de­pen­dence. Males play no role in parental care. (Fen­ton and Bar­clay, 1980)

• Parental Investment
• altricial
• pre-fertilization
  • provisioning
  • protecting
    • female
• pre-hatching/birth
  • provisioning
    • female
  • protecting
    • female
• pre-weaning/fledging
  • provisioning
    • female
  • protecting
    • female
• pre-independence
  • provisioning
    • female
  • protecting
    • female

Lifes­pan/Longevity

The lifes­pan of M. lu­cifu­gus is ex­tended by their abil­ity to find food and in­habit a va­ri­ety of roosts. These char­ac­ter­is­tics allow ex­pan­sion of their habi­tat to new ranges, but also con­tribute to their sur­vival. My­otis lu­cifu­gus live ap­prox­i­mately 6 to 7 years and often live well be­yond 10 years. A 31 year-old male was dis­cov­ered in south­east­ern On­tario. Ev­i­dence in­di­cates that males tend to live longer than fe­males. Mor­tal­ity rate is the great­est dur­ing the first win­ter when new pups have con­sid­er­ably less weight than their adult coun­ter­parts at the start of hi­ber­na­tion. (Fen­ton and Bar­clay, 1980; Nowak, 1994)

• Range lifespan
  Status: wild

  31 (high) years

• Typical lifespan
  Status: wild

  6 to 7 years

• Average lifespan
  Status: wild

  6 to 7 years

• Average lifespan
  Status: captivity

  30.0 years

  Max Planck Institute for Demographic Research

Be­hav­ior

Lit­tle brown bats are pri­mar­ily noc­tur­nal and emerge from their roosts at dusk. Pri­mary ac­tiv­ity oc­curs about two or three hours after dusk and sec­ondary ac­tiv­ity may occur be­fore dawn; most in­di­vid­u­als re­turn to the roost by four or five o’clock in the morn­ing. These bats usu­ally enter daily tor­por. Dur­ing the win­ter, hi­ber­na­tion time de­pends on al­ti­tude and lo­ca­tion of the roosts. It usu­ally starts be­tween Sep­tem­ber and No­vem­ber and ends in March to May. The young re­main ac­tive longer in the fall to build fat de­posits to last the win­ter. My­otis lu­cifu­gus does not mi­grate long dis­tances for hi­ber­na­tion roosts. In­di­vid­u­als travel only up to 100 miles. This species does not show ter­ri­to­ri­al­ity at roosts, and large colonies of as many as 300,000 bats have been re­ported in a sin­gle roost. (Bar­bour and Davis, 1969; Cock­rum, 1956; Nowak, 1994)

Dur­ing hi­ber­na­tion, lit­tle brown bats un­dergo re­peated pe­ri­ods of tor­por last­ing 12 to 19 days, but may re­main tor­pid for as long as 83 days. Sig­nals for the end of hi­ber­na­tion in­clude weather con­di­tions of the area and arousal of neigh­bor­ing bats. (Fen­ton and Bar­clay, 1980; Tut­tle, 1991)

Lit­tle brown bats vary their body tem­per­a­tures greatly. These bats can be cooled to 6.5 de­grees Cel­sius and heated to tem­per­a­tures of 54 de­grees Cel­sius with­out harm. My­otis lu­cifu­gus de­posits 13 dis­tinct type of brown fat, al­low­ing in­di­vid­u­als to ef­fi­ciently and rapidly pro­duce heat dur­ing arousal from hi­ber­na­tion tor­por.

My­otis lu­cifu­gus oc­cul­tus can in­crease urine con­cen­tra­tion in order to bet­ter with­stand water stress in low hu­mid­ity en­vi­ron­ments with lim­ited water sup­ply. Only this sub­species is known to do this, how­ever; most sub­species of M. lu­cifu­gus have a poor abil­ity to reg­u­late urine con­cen­tra­tion. In gen­eral, M. lu­cifu­gus usu­ally lives within close prox­im­ity to water. (Fen­ton and Bar­clay, 1980; Tut­tle, 1991)

My­otis lu­cifu­gus in­vests a large amount of time each day groom­ing. In­di­vid­u­als use their claws to groom the fur, and tongue and teeth to clean their wing mem­branes. (Fen­ton and Bar­clay, 1980)

• Key Behaviors
• arboreal
• troglophilic
• flies
• nocturnal
• crepuscular
• motile
• sedentary
• hibernation
• daily torpor
• social
• colonial

Home Range

Lit­tle brown bats travel sev­eral kilo­me­ters be­tween day roosts and feed­ing sites. (Nowak, 1994)

Com­mu­ni­ca­tion and Per­cep­tion

My­otis lu­cifu­gus pro­duces fre­quency mod­u­lated (FM) calls at 45kHz, their fun­da­men­tal fre­quency. These calls last 1 to 5 mil­lisec­onds and sweep from 80 to 40 kHz. Cruis­ing bats typ­i­cally pro­duce 20 calls per sec­ond to de­tect prey and ob­jects. (Fen­ton and Bar­clay, 1980; Fen­ton and Bell, 1979)

My­otis lu­cifu­gus alert other bats with non-echolo­ca­tion calls if they are fly­ing on a col­li­sion course dur­ing feed­ing. They emit this call by re­duc­ing the fre­quency of the ter­mi­nal por­tion of a sweep call to 25 kHz. Ad­di­tion­ally, they may use echolo­ca­tion calls, vi­sual cues, such as land­marks, and pos­si­bly chem­i­cal cues to lo­cate roosts; they can find their roosts from 180 miles away. Mother and young com­mu­ni­cate through a few, com­plex vo­cal­iza­tions. There is no in­for­ma­tion about alarm or dis­tress calls. (Fen­ton and Bar­clay, 1980; Kurta, 1995)

• Communication Channels
• visual
• tactile
• acoustic
• chemical

• Other Communication Modes
• pheromones

• Perception Channels
• visual
• tactile
• acoustic
• ultrasound
• echolocation
• chemical

Food Habits

My­otis lu­cifu­gus is an ef­fi­cient in­sect preda­tor, es­pe­cially when in­sects are in patches and at close range (ap­prox­i­mately less than one meter). Lit­tle brown bats, along with many other in­sec­tiv­o­rous bats, are op­por­tunis­tic feed­ers and catch prey by aer­ial hawk­ing and glean­ing tac­tics. My­otis lu­cifu­gus flies faster near the end of the at­tack, when ap­proach­ing prey. Dur­ing glean­ing, these bats hover ap­prox­i­mately 30 cm from the prey. My­otis lu­cifu­gus typ­i­cally feeds on swarms of in­sects, sav­ing time and en­ergy to search for food. There is no ev­i­dence of ter­ri­to­r­ial pro­tec­tion of feed­ing areas, but in­di­vid­u­als re­turn to areas where they have had prior feed­ing suc­cess. My­otis lu­cifu­gus has dif­fer­ent se­lec­tiv­ity based upon the arrange­ments of in­sects. In large swarms of mat­ing in­sects, these bats con­cen­trate one or two species to feed on, but when in­sects are dis­persed, lit­tle brown bats are less se­lec­tive and feed on mul­ti­ple species. Food de­mand of lac­tat­ing fe­males in­creases and preg­nant or lac­tat­ing fe­males usu­ally se­lect larger in­sects than males or non­preg­nant fe­males. Nor­mally, these bats feed on in­sects whose length ranges from 3 to 10 mm. These bats typ­i­cally eat half of their body weight per night (when ac­tive) and lac­tat­ing fe­males eat ap­prox­i­mately 110 per­cent of their body weight per night. My­otis lu­cifu­gus chews and processes food rel­a­tively quickly. Mas­ti­ca­tion rate is seven jaw cy­cles per sec­ond, and food takes only 35 to 54 min­utes to pass items through the di­ges­tive sys­tem. (An­thony and Kunz, 1977; Bel­wood and Fen­ton, 1976; Fen­ton and Bar­clay, 1980; Rat­cliffe and Daw­son, 2003; Wil­son and Ruff, 1999)

My­otis lu­cifu­gus uses FM echolo­ca­tion, down­ward sweep­ing pulses of 80 to 40 kHZ that last from 1 to 5 msec. These wave­lengths give the great­est qual­ity of de­tec­tion for 3 to 8 mm size prey, and M. lu­cifu­gus con­sumes prey av­er­ag­ing 3 to 10 mm in size. The same FM call is used for lo­ca­tion of both fly­ing and sta­tion­ary in­sects. The ap­proach phase of their call has sec­ond and third har­mon­ics, but dur­ing the feed­ing buzz, the fre­quency is fo­cused at 47kHz. The rate of call pro­duc­tion while chas­ing prey is 200 calls per sec­ond. My­otis lu­cifu­gus emits a high-pulse repet­i­tive call when near­ing a land­ing site. (Fen­ton and Bar­clay, 1980; An­thony and Kunz, 1977; Bar­bour and Davis, 1969; Fen­ton and Bar­clay, 1980; Fen­ton and Bell, 1979; Rat­cliffe and Daw­son, 2003; Wil­son and Ruff, 1999)

My­otis lu­cifu­gus catches free-fly­ing in­sects in wooded areas, fields, and over water, but also preys on in­sects on the water sur­face. In­sects caught dur­ing flight are taken by swoop­ing or dip­ping ma­neu­vers. Most ac­tiv­ity over water oc­curs be­tween 1 to 2 m over the sur­face and the in­sects are taken by the mouth. Most feed­ing ac­tiv­ity oc­curs about two hours after dark. (Fen­ton and Bell, 1979)

Lit­tle brown bats feed largely on aquatic in­sects. Midges are the pri­mary source of food of M. lu­cifu­gus, but a large part of their diet comes from other aquatic in­sects. When avail­able, bee­tles are eas­ily iden­ti­fied by echolo­ca­tion and eas­ily cap­tured. Other in­sects con­sumed in­clude cad­dis­flies, moths, mayflies, lacewings, and oc­ca­sion­ally mos­qui­toes. (An­thony and Kunz, 1977; Fen­ton and Bar­clay, 1980)

• Primary Diet
• carnivore
  • insectivore

• Animal Foods
• insects

Pre­da­tion

Do­mes­tic cats have be­come adept at catch­ing bats due to the close prox­im­i­ties of roosts to human habi­ta­tions. Many preda­tors take ad­van­tage of the high con­cen­tra­tions of bats in roosts. Preda­tors such as martens and fish­ers take ad­van­tage of weak young that fall or hi­ber­nat­ing in­di­vid­u­als that are dis­lodged by groom­ing ac­tiv­i­ties. Other preda­tors of M. lu­cifu­gus in­clude mice, owls, weasels, hawks, snakes, rac­coons, do­mes­tic cats, and other small car­ni­vores. (Fen­ton and Bar­clay, 1980; Grif­fin, 1958)

• Anti-predator Adaptations
• cryptic

• Known Predators

  • mice (Peromyscus)
  • owls (Strigiformes)
  • weasels (Mustela)
  • hawks (Accipitridae)
  • snakes (Squamata)
  • raccoons (Procyon)
  • martens (Martes americana)
  • fishers (Martes pennanti)
  • domestic cats (Felis silvestris)

Ecosys­tem Roles

Lit­tle brown bats have a major im­pact on the in­sect pop­u­la­tions around their roosts. Ac­tive bats eat half of their body weight per night and lac­tat­ing fe­males eat more than their body weight per night. One M. lu­cifu­gus con­sumes ap­prox­i­mately 3 to 7 grams of in­sects each night. (Bar­bour and Davis, 1969; Fen­ton and Bar­clay, 1980; Wil­son and Ruff, 1999)

Tape­worms, and ec­topar­a­sites such as fleas, mites and bed bugs are car­ried by lit­tle brown bats. (Bar­bour and Davis, 1969; Fen­ton and Bar­clay, 1980; Fen­ton and Bell, 1979)

Eco­nomic Im­por­tance for Hu­mans: Pos­i­tive

Mem­bers of this species are heav­ily re­searched and pro­vide sci­en­tists with a bat model to test and study many as­pects of the order, in­clud­ing echolo­ca­tion, so­cial be­hav­ior, feed­ing, and habi­tat use. Ad­di­tion­ally, lit­tle brown bats eat pests that trans­mit dis­eases and eat agri­cul­tural prod­ucts. They are also preda­tors of mos­qui­toes and other pest around human habi­tats. (Bar­bour and Davis, 1969; Wil­son and Ruff, 1999)

• Positive Impacts
• research and education
• controls pest population

Eco­nomic Im­por­tance for Hu­mans: Neg­a­tive

My­otis lu­cifu­gus is the tar­get of con­trol mea­sures due to the abun­dance of the species. These bats in­habit at­tics, roofs, trees, and other areas in close prox­im­ity to hu­mans; there­fore, home­own­ers have spent large amounts of money try­ing to er­rad­i­cate M. lu­cifu­gus from these areas. Ra­bies trans­mis­sion to hu­mans is ex­tremely low, and only a small per­cent­age of M. lu­cifu­gus are in­fected with the dis­ease. Al­though ra­bies in M. lu­cifu­gus is low, other par­a­sites such as tape­worms, fleas, mites and bed bugs are com­mon. (Fen­ton and Bar­clay, 1980)

• Negative Impacts
• injures humans
  • bites or stings
  • causes disease in humans
  • carries human disease
• causes or carries domestic animal disease
• household pest

Con­ser­va­tion Sta­tus

My­otis lu­cifu­gus is under no spe­cial con­ser­va­tion sta­tus as the species is abun­dant across North Amer­ica. These bats thrives with ex­pan­sion of human pop­u­la­tions, as many of their roost­ing sites are built by hu­mans. In spite of their over­all abun­dance, some pop­u­la­tions have suf­fered de­clines due to con­trol mea­sures and build-up of fat-sol­u­ble pes­ti­cides in their bod­ies. (Fen­ton and Bar­clay, 1980; Kunz, et al., 1977)

Tem­per­ate North Amer­i­can bats are now threat­ened by a fun­gal dis­ease called “white-nose syn­drome.” This dis­ease has dev­as­tated east­ern North Amer­i­can bat pop­u­la­tions at hi­ber­na­tion sites since 2007. The fun­gus, Ge­omyces de­struc­tans, grows best in cold, humid con­di­tions that are typ­i­cal of many bat hi­ber­nac­ula. The fun­gus grows on, and in some cases in­vades, the bod­ies of hi­ber­nat­ing bats and seems to re­sult in dis­tur­bance from hi­ber­na­tion, caus­ing a de­bil­i­tat­ing loss of im­por­tant meta­bolic re­sources and mass deaths. Mor­tal­ity rates at some hi­ber­na­tion sites have been as high as 90%. (Cryan, 2010; Na­tional Park Ser­vice, Wildlife Health Cen­ter, 2010)

• IUCN Red List

  Least Concern
  More information

• IUCN Red List

  Least Concern
  More information

• US Federal List

  No special status

• CITES

  No special status

• State of Michigan List

  No special status

Other Com­ments

There are six sub­species of M. lu­cifu­gus: M. l. alas­cen­sis, M. l. caris­sima, M. l. lu­cifu­gus, M. l. oc­cul­tus, M. l. per­nox, and M. l. re­lic­tus. Sev­eral of these sub­species were pre­vi­ously con­sid­ered sep­a­rate species: M. l. oc­cul­tus, M. l. per­nox, and M. l. caris­sima. (Fen­ton and Bar­clay, 1980; Hall, 1981)

Con­trib­u­tors

Tanya Dewey (ed­i­tor), An­i­mal Di­ver­sity Web.

Nancy Shef­ferly (ed­i­tor), An­i­mal Di­ver­sity Web.

Aaron Havens (au­thor), Uni­ver­sity of Michi­gan-Ann Arbor, Phil Myers (ed­i­tor, in­struc­tor), Mu­seum of Zo­ol­ogy, Uni­ver­sity of Michi­gan-Ann Arbor.

Ref­er­ences

An­thony, E., T. Kunz. 1977. Feed­ing Strate­gies of the Lit­tle Brown Bat, My­otis Lu­cifu­gus, In South­ern New Hamp­shire. Ecol­ogy, 58: 775-786.

Bar­bour, R., W. Davis. 1969. Bats of Amer­ica. Lex­ing­ton, Ken­tucky: The Uni­ver­sity Press of Ken­tucky.

Bas­sett, J., J. Wiebers. 1979. Sub­spe­cific Dif­fer­ences in the Urine Con­cen­trat­ing Abil­ity of My­otis lu­cifu­gus. Jour­nal of Mam­mal­ogy, 60(2): 395-397.

Bel­wood, J., M. Fen­ton. 1976. Vari­a­tion in the diet of My­otis lu­cifu­gus (Chi­roptera:Ves­per­til­ion­idae). Cana­dian Jour­nal of Zo­ol­ogy, 54: 1674-1678.

Cock­rum, E. 1956. Hom­ing, move­ments and longevity of bats. J. Mam­mal, 37: 48-57.

Cryan, P. 2010. "White-nose syn­drome threat­ens the sur­vival of hi­ber­nat­ing bats in North Amer­ica" (On-line). U.S. Ge­o­log­i­cal Sur­vey, Fort Collins Sci­ence Cen­ter. Ac­cessed Sep­tem­ber 16, 2010 at http://​www.​fort.​usgs.​gov/​WNS/​.

Fen­ton, M., R. Bar­clay. 1980. My­otis lu­cifu­gus. Mam­malian Species, 142: 1-8.

Fen­ton, M., G. Bell. 1979. Echolo­ca­tion and feed­ing be­hav­iour in four species of g.​Myotis (Chi­roptera). Cana­dian Jour­nal of Zo­ol­ogy, 57: 1271-1277.

Grif­fin, D. 1958. Lis­ten­ing in the Dark. New Haven, Con­necti­cut: Yale Uni­ver­sity Press.

Hall, E. 1981. The Mam­mals of North Amer­ica. New York: John Wiley and Sons.

Koop­man, K., F. Gud­munds­son. 1966. Amer­i­can Mu­seum Novi­tates. New York: Amer­i­can Mu­seum of Nat­ural His­tory.

Kunz, T., E. An­thony, W. Ru­mage III. 1977. Mor­tal­ity of lit­tle brown bats. J. Wildl. Man­age, 41: 476-483.

Kurta, A. 1995. Mam­mals of the Great Lakes Re­gion. Ann Arbor, MI: The Uni­ver­sity of Michi­gan Press.

Kurta, A., T. Kunz. 1988. Roost­ing Meta­bolic Rate and Body Tem­pa­ture of Male Lit­tle Brown Bats (My­otis lu­cifu­gus) in Sum­mer. Jour­nal of Mam­mal­ogy, 69(3): 645-651.

Na­tional Park Ser­vice, Wildlife Health Cen­ter, 2010. "White-nose syn­drome" (On-line). Na­tional Park Ser­vice, Wildlife Health. Ac­cessed Sep­tem­ber 16, 2010 at http://​www.​nature.​nps.​gov/​biology/​wildlifehealth/​White_​Nose_​Syndrome.​cfm.

Nowak, R. 1994. Walker's Bats of the World. Bal­ti­more, Mary­land: The Johns Hop­kins Uni­ver­sity Press.

Rat­cliffe, J., J. Daw­son. 2003. Be­hav­ioural flex­i­bil­ity: the lit­tle brown bat, My­otis lu­cifu­gus, and the north­ern long-eared but, M. septen­tri­on­alis, both glean and hawk prey. An­i­mal Be­hav­iour, 66: 847-856.

Schowal­ter, D. 1980. Swarm­ing, Re­pro­duc­tion, and Early Hi­ber­na­tion of My­otis lu­cifu­gus and M. volans in Al­berta, Canada. Jour­nal of Mam­mal­ogy, 61(2): 350-354.

Tut­tle, M. 1991. How North Amer­ica's Bats Sur­vive the Win­ter. Bats, 9(3): 7-12.

Wai-Ping, V., M. Fen­ton. 1988. Non­s­e­lec­tive Mat­ing in Lit­tle Brown Bats (My­otis lu­cifu­gus). Jour­nal of Mam­mal­ogy, 69(3): 641-645.

Wil­son, D., S. Ruff. 1999. The Smith­son­ian book of North Amer­i­can mam­mals. Wash­ing­ton D.C.: Smith­son­ian In­sti­tu­tion Press in as­so­ci­a­tion with the Amer­i­can So­ci­ety of Mam­mal­o­gists.