Nature

Mexican Free Tail Bats [VIDEO]

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Tony Maples Photography

 

Mexican Free Tail Bats

Photo: theflashlist.com
Mexican Free Tail Bats exiting a cave in Concan, Texas. It is estimated that it takes up to two hours every day for the 10-12 million bats to exit the cave.

The Mexican free-tailed bat is usually reddish, grey, or dark brown, and medium in size. While most of them prefer caves like this one, they are known to roost in old buildings, under bridges and similar areas, and then migrate to Central America for the winter months.

These bats are immensely beneficial, as they eat a massive amount of insects each night. Most of these species of bats have around 500,000 to a million bats in a colony, this colony is the second largest in the world with 12 million, eating an estimated 3,000 tons of insects per night.

This cave is also a maternity colony; a colony where the bats are born. One pup is born in the summer, and the newborns roost high in the cave where it is warm, and it’s mother must find her own pup alongside all of the others to feed it. Although it is not known for sure, it is thought that each pup has an individual call that it’s mother can recognize. Once matured, they can live up to 18 years.