| Long-legged Bat | |
|---|---|
| Conservation status | |
| Scientific classification | |
| Kingdom: | Animalia |
| Phylum: | Chordata |
| Class: | Mammalia |
| Order: | Chiroptera |
| Family: | Phyllostomidae |
| Genus: | Macrophyllum |
| Species: | M. macrophyllum |
| Binomial name | |
| Macrophyllum macrophyllum Schinz, 1821 |
|
The Long-legged Bat, Macrophyllum macrophyllum, is a bat species from South and Central America. It is monotypic in its genus.
It hunts close over the water surfaces of lakes and slowly flowing streams, where it seizes insects right above or directly off the surface in a manner similar to Noctilio leporinus and Myotis daubentoni. This is an interesting example of convergent evolution which may imply just how valuable a habitat the water surface is to insectivorous bats.
The sound emission, in contrast is quite different from the other water-hunting bats. M. macrophyllum has a very prominent noseleaf, and it emits the echolocation sounds through the nostrils. The time frequency characteristics of the sounds are almost identical to those of Micronycteris microtis: short (1-2 ms) multiharmonic FM sweeps with most energy in the second harmonic between 95 and 75 kHz. However, the sounds resemble those of a number of other phyllostomid bats, including Micronycteris microtis, but new results indicate that the intensity is significantly higher.