Bats show up on Halloween decorations every October, but the real animals are far more interesting than spooky. They fly with their hands, find food with sound, and help farmers and forests all over the world. Here are 30 fun facts about bats to share with kids, students or anyone who's curious.
When you're done, try drawing your own bat or print a page from our monster coloring pages for a friendly Halloween scene.
- Bats are the only mammals that can truly fly. Flying squirrels and sugar gliders only glide.
- A bat's wing is really a hand. Its long finger bones are covered by a thin, stretchy skin called a membrane.
- Their wings are very flexible. Bats can change the shape of their wings mid-flight, which helps them twist and turn to catch insects.
- Bats hang upside down to rest. Special tendons in their feet lock their toes in place, so hanging takes very little effort.
- Hanging upside down helps them take off. They simply let go and drop into flight.
- There are more than 1,400 kinds of bats. That's roughly one in every five kinds of mammal on Earth.
- One of the smallest mammals is a bat. Kitti's hog-nosed bat, also called the bumblebee bat, weighs about 2 grams, less than a US penny.
- The biggest bats are called flying foxes. Some have wingspans of around 1.5 meters (5 feet).
- Bats live almost everywhere except the coldest polar regions and a few remote islands.
- Bats are not blind. All bats can see, and many fruit bats have good eyesight.
- Many bats use echolocation. They make high-pitched sounds and listen to the echoes to find insects and avoid obstacles in the dark.
- Most of these sounds are too high for people to hear.
- Echolocation is so precise that some bats can detect something as thin as a human hair.
- Not all bats echolocate. Many fruit-eating bats rely mostly on their eyes and noses.
- Most bats eat insects. A single bat can eat a huge number of mosquitoes, moths and beetles in one night.
- That makes bats natural pest control, saving farmers money on crops.
- Some bats eat fruit and help plant forests by spreading seeds in their droppings.
- Some bats drink nectar. They pollinate plants like agave, the plant used to make agave syrup.
- Only three species are vampire bats, and they live in Central and South America. They mostly feed on the blood of animals like cattle and birds, and usually take only a small amount.
- A few bats catch fish or frogs.
- A baby bat is called a pup.
- Most bat moms have just one pup a year.
- Bats live in caves, trees, rock cracks, bridges and buildings.
- Some live in huge groups. Bracken Cave in Texas is home to millions of Mexican free-tailed bats every summer, one of the largest bat colonies in the world.
- Other bats live alone or in small groups under leaves.
- Some bats make tents by biting leaves so they fold over like a roof.
- Many bats hibernate in winter when insects are hard to find.
- Some bats migrate to warmer places instead.
- Bats can live a long time for their size. Some small bats live more than 30 years in the wild.
- There's a Bat Week every year at the end of October, right before Halloween, to celebrate these helpful animals.
Many bat species are in trouble because of habitat loss and a disease called white-nose syndrome that affects hibernating bats in North America. Ways families can help:
- Leave dead trees standing when safe, as homes for bats.
- Avoid using insect sprays in the garden.
- Put up a bat house.
- Never touch a bat with bare hands. If you find one on the ground, tell an adult and contact local wildlife services.
