Guadalcanal monkey-faced bat

Appearance

It has thick and fluffy fur that almost entirely conceals their ears. Its color is mostly black, though its wings are occasionally mottled white., Individual hairs on its back are 12–14 mm (0.47–0.55 in) long.

It weighs 438–506 g (0.966–1.116 lb).

Range and habitat

It was initially discovered on Guadalcanal Island, and has also been reported on New Georgia Island. It was once reported on Santa Isabel Island in 1931, but this was actually a greater monkey-faced bat that had been misidentified. It has been documented from 0–400 m (0–1,312 ft) above sea level, but it likely occurs up to elevations of 1,000 m (3,300 ft).

The Guadalcanal monkey-faced bat or Guadalcanal flying monkey is a megabat endemic to Solomon Islands. The only record of its occurrence on New Georgia Island is a single skull discovered in 1975.

Pins are Wikidata “endemic to” fields. Orange dots, when present, are GBIF occurrence tiles — survey bias included.

In crisis

It is listed as an endangered species. It is currently evaluated as endangered by the IUCN. It is threatened by hunting for bushmeat.

Logging is also a threat to this species, as it likely roosts in hollow trees during the day. It has consistently been evaluated as endangered since it was first assessed in 1994, with the exception of 1996–2008 when it was evaluated as critically endangered.

Guadalcanal monkey-faced bat is Endangered on this catalog because that is the IUCN category stored on Wikidata. Confirm the official criteria and any later count on iucnredlist.org.

Sources

Written for this catalog from the English Wikipedia article on Guadalcanal monkey-faced bat, Wikidata item Q720567. Family and order context is original field-guide writing about the group, not a copied assessment of this one species. Wikipedia text is CC BY-SA. Not an IUCN assessment. Counts, when quoted, can change — confirm them on the recovery programme and on iucnredlist.org.