Behavioural ecology of bats

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My students and I study the behaviour, ecology, and evolution of bats. We work with live, free-living bats in the field, and with preserved specimens in museum collections (mainly the Royal Ontario Museum in Toronto). We are particularly interested in the evolution and adaptive radiation of bats. Using Micro-CT scanning we have discovered a connection between two bones (the stylohyal and the tympanic) that always allows us to identify bats capable of laryngeal echolocation. While all bats can fly, not all echolocate and some echolocators (from a family of mainly non-echolocating fruit bats) produce their biosonar signals while clicking their tongues. More commonly echolocation signals are produced in the largynx. We also use microphones sensitive to ultrasonic sounds to monitor the echolocation calls of bats. This approach allows us to identify species, monitor foraging behaviour, and measure relative levels of habitat use. This information allows us to assess the importance of different habitats and landscape features to bats. The results could inform decisions about positioning wind turbines to minimize collisions between bats and turbines. Information about how bat use habitat is combined with data on the insect species eaten by them as a means of studying community ecology. The echolocation behaviour of laryngeally echolocating bats is very flexible because bats adjust their signals according to the situations in which they are operating. We study the influence of both habitat and social setting on call design.