That’s
right bats aren’t scary, they are just misunderstood.
Everyone
thinks of bats and immediately thinks of vampires, rabies, and death, and since
it is Halloween let’s talk vampires, rabies, and death!
Vampires!
So,
why is that vampires and bats go together like Oreos and milk?
Is
it because Count Orlok, the Nosferatu vampire, bears a striking resemblance to
the common vampire bat, desmodus rotundus, particularly around the ears
and fangs? Maybe it is because bats look
like winged mice? In fact, the German
word for bat, “fleidermaus”, means “flying mouse”! Maybe it is because, like vampires and the
undead, most bats only come out at night?
But mostly we must blame Bram Stroker, who in the 1890’s, while
researching Dracula, came upon an exaggerated story in a New York newspaper
about vampire bats of the South American pampas, who had drained a horse of
blood!
The first Spanish explorers of Central and South America discovered three species of small, mouse -sized bats, that feed only on blood.
These three species of “true” vampire bats2 are the only bats of all the 1,300 bat species that drink blood, and they don’t suck it from their victims, who are usually large, hoofed mammals. They normally land on the ground near their intended victim, often while they are sleeping. Then the bat climbs the animal’s body to find the right place to bite.
To find the best spot to bite, vampire bats use specialized heat-sensing “pit organs” near their noses, to detect small differences in body temperature from blood flowing near the surface of their victim’s skin. And once the spot is chosen, the bat uses its razor sharp, blade-like incisors to make a small about 1/8 inch (3-5 mm) incision, wide and deep, in the skin of its victim. Because the bat’s teeth are so sharp, the animal seldom knows it has been bitten, and anti-coagulants and pain killers in the bat’s saliva help to keep victims unaware that they have been bitten and are being fed upon.
But vampire bats,
unlike mythical vampires, do not suck blood, instead they lap up the blood like
a cat, with a specialized tongue that has two sideways grooves on the bottom
that expand and contract as the bat feeds, helping to move the blood into their
mouth. The anticlotting proteins in the
bat’s saliva keep the blood flowing until the bat has drunk its fill, which
might take about 20 minutes. Vampire
bats need about 2 tablespoons (20 grams) of blood per day, and they cannot
survive more than two or three days without a meal.
But
the most likely reason bats have been associated with the undead for millennia,
is because they can spread rabies!
Rabies and
Death
Rabies
is a very dangerous zoonotic disease, affecting all mammals, which kills up to
70,000 people per year worldwide3.
It is caused by the virus, rabies lyssavirus, which after
entering the body through a cut, bite or other break in the skin, travels along
the nervous system until it reaches and infects the brain, causing
encephalitis, or swelling, and then death.
The virus travels at an estimated 1/8 inch (3 mm)
an hour and it may take anywhere from ten to more than sixty days to reach the
brain, depending on your size and where you are bitten. Once it reaches your brain, it is fatal, with
only three people in recorded history having survived, and all of those
received aggressive immunotherapy and medical treatment, without this
aggressive treatment no one survives.
However, even with this type of treatment, two of the three suffered
from severe neurological damage4.
The good news, if that can be said of rabies, is that rabies is 100%
treatable, before the virus reaches the brain and you no longer need
twenty shots in the abdomen, only six shots
in the upper arm.
Fun Bat
Facts...
· Bats
are found on every continent, except Antarctica.
· Bats
can live almost anywhere, except polar regions and deserts.
· A
young bat can eat 600 mosquitos in an hour.
· Most
bat species hibernate in caves in the winter and roost in tree cavities during
the summer.
· Bat
echolocation calls are very high pitched, up to 110kHz, and humans can
typically only hear up to 20 kHz.
· Over
500 species of plants, including mango, banana, cocoa, and guava, are
pollinated by plants.
Don’t forget to come back next week and read “What Can You Do With a 10
by 10 Tarp ©”, where we will talk about the different kind of shelters you can
build with a 10 by 10 foot (3 by 3 m) tarp.
I
hope that you continue to enjoy The Woodsman’s Journal Online and look for me
on YouTube at BandanaMan Productions for other related videos, HERE. Don’t forget to follow me on both The
Woodsman’s Journal Online, HERE,
and subscribe to BandanaMan Productions on YouTube. If you have questions, as always, feel free
to leave a comment on either site. I
announce new articles on Facebook at Eric Reynolds, on Instagram at
bandanamanaproductions, and on VK at Eric Reynolds, so watch for me.
That
is all for now, and as always, until next time, Happy Trails!
Notes
1
“Which Came First, The Bat Or The Vampire” by
2
The common vampire bat, desmodus rotundus, the white winged vampire bat,
diaemus youngi, and the hairy-legged vampire bat, dipylla ecaudata.
From
“Which Came First, The Bat Or The Vampire” by Delta Pest Control
3
“Rabies”, by Ron Koury and Steven J. Warrington
4
“Bats and Rabies” by Bryan Yeaton
5 “Vampire
Bats – The Good, the Bad, and the Amazing”, by Texas Tech University
Sources
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Control, https://www.deltapestcontrolservice.com/why-are-bats-and-vampires-so-closely-associated,
accessed October 29, 2023
Galetti, Mauro; Pedrosa,
Felipe; and Keuroghlian, Alexine; “Liquid lunch – vampire bats feed on invasive
feral pigs and other ungulates”, November 2016, Frontiers in Ecology and the
Environment, 14(9), pages 505-506 https://www.researchgate.net/publication/309591571_Liquid_lunch_-_vampire_bats_feed_on_invasive_feral_pigs_and_other_ungulates,
accessed November 4, 2023
Hgregory, “Bats of
Missouri”, December 31, 2019, https://sites.wustl.edu/monh/bats-of-missouri/,
accessed October 29, 2023
Koury,
Ron and Warrington, Steven J.; “Rabies”, National Library of
Medicine, October 31, 2022, https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/books/NBK448076/,
accessed November 4, 2023
Lang, Andrew; The Red Book
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accessed October 29, 2023
Morgan, Clint N.;
Ammerman, Loren K.; Demere, Krysta; and Maudlin, Matthew R.; Field
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2019, https://www.researchgate.net/figure/The-general-anatomy-of-a-bat_fig1_330545977,
accessed November 4, 2023
Texas
Tech University; “Vampire Bats – The Good, the Bad, and the Amazing”, May
2014 - January 2015, https://www.depts.ttu.edu/nsrl/get-involved/downloads/vampire-bat-exhibit.pdf,
accessed November 4, 2023
Wikimedia, “Desmodus
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accessed October 29, 2023
Wikimedia; Illustration
for The red book of animal stories, 1899, https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:The_red_animal_story_book_-_plate_facing_page_196.png,
accessed October 29, 2023
Wikimedia, “Le Vampire”,
by R. de Moraine, Les tribunaux secrets, 1864, https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Moraine_le_vampire.jpg,
accessed October 29, 2023
Wikimedia; “Geographical
distribution of common vampire bat (Desmodus rotundus)”, from Mammals of
Mexico, 2014, edited by Gerardo Ceballos, https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Desmodus_rotundus_map.svg,
accessed November 4, 2023
Yeaton, Bryan; “Bats and
Rabies (But mostly bats)”, Wilderness Medicine Newsletter, May/June 1997, Vol.
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accessed October 29, 2023
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