Silver-haired bat
Lasionycteris noctivagans
— Where the name comes from
Lasionycteris is “shaggy bat”, from the Greek lásios and nykterís; noctivagans is the Latin “night-wandering”, from nox and vagari — the same construction as “noctambulant”. The common name looks to the silver tips of the hairs on a very black ground, which in moonlight give it a metallic sheen.
— Facts
- Group
- Mammals · Mammalia
- Order
- Bats
- Habitat
- Mature woodland with dead trees; it roosts under loose bark
- Range
- North America, from Alaska to northern Mexico
- Size
- 9–11 cm including tail, 30 cm wingspan, 8–12 g
- Diet
- Insectivore — small insects in slow flight over clearings and water
- Lifespan
- Up to 12 years
— Characteristics
- 01
It nearly always roosts under the loose bark of standing dead trees.
- 02
It flies slowly and erratically, in low, jerky lines.
- 03
It migrates for thousands of kilometres, and winters in the southern United States.
— What sets it apart
It depends on dead trees, which is exactly what tidy forestry removes first. It picks the flap of bark peeling away from a standing dead trunk and slips underneath, and that kind of roost lasts only a few years before the bark falls: the species needs not one dead tree but a continuous supply of trees that die. In managed woods where dead timber is systematically cleared, it disappears without anyone ever having disturbed it directly.
