Long-fingered bat
Myotis capaccinii
— Where the name comes from
Capaccinii recalls Francesco Capaccini, a 19th-century cardinal and papal diplomat who was also an astronomer and a man of natural science — one of those learned prelates who filled the academies of papal Rome. The species was dedicated to him by Bonaparte, that is by Carlo Luciano Bonaparte, Napoleon’s nephew and a first-rate ornithologist.
— Facts
- Group
- Mammals · Mammalia
- Order
- Bats
- Habitat
- Caves near Mediterranean rivers and lakes; hunting just above the water
- Range
- The Mediterranean basin, from Spain to Iran
- Size
- 4.3–5.3 cm of body, 25 cm wingspan, 6–15 g
- Diet
- Insectivore — aquatic insects and small fish raked off the surface
- Lifespan
- Up to 9 years
— Characteristics
- 01
It has very large feet with which it rakes the surface of the water.
- 02
It is the only European bat known to catch fish.
- 03
It depends on caves near clean watercourses, a combination ever harder to find.
— What sets it apart
It is the only bat in Europe that fishes. For decades piscivory was thought a tropical speciality, the preserve of the American fishing bats; then DNA analysis of droppings from Spanish colonies turned up the scales and tissue of freshwater fish, and night filming showed the animal sinking its feet and hooking on. It is not its main diet — it lives mostly on insects — but it shows that the raking technique, once acquired, opens the door to prey nobody expected.
