Trinibats w-iildlife_policy_recommendation

Apt.# 8 Lady Chancellor Apts, St. Anns, Port of Spain, Trinidad

Home: 624-2223 / Cell: 683-6261

Ms Candace Leung Woo GabrielMinistry of the Environment and Water ResourcesLevel 26, Tower DThe WaterfrontPort of Spain

RE: Draft Wildlife Policy - Section: 1.4.3 Vermin: The Third Schedule of the Conservation of Wildlife Act 1958 (Chapter 76:01) lists species classified vermin.

Delisting of Bats as Vermin Species in Trinidad and Tobago

My name is, Geoffrey Gomes. I have recently been appointed to the Bat Specialists Group of the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN): http://www.iucn.org

I am a former Zoological Council Member of the Emperor Valley Zoo’s Management Committee (1985 - 1995), and former Trinidad and Tobago Island Representative at the Society of Caribbean Ornithology. I have served as Ornithologist on the Cabinet appointed, Wildlife Conservation Committee (WLCC) of Trinidad and Tobago through the last five Government administrations. During my 2008 tenure on this Committee, I proposed to the WLCC Board, an amendment to the Trinidad and Tobago Conservation of Wildlife Act, regarding the delisting of bats as “vermin” species in Trinidad and Tobago wildlife legislation. This long overdue proposal to amend the vermin status of bats was accepted by the WLCC, and it was decided that this initiative would join the many other proposed amendments to Trinidad and Tobago Wildlife Policy that government and various stakeholders are currently addressing.

There are 67 different species of bats recorded in Trinidad and Tobago, representing nearly 70% of all local mammalian fauna. In 2010, I co-founded with my colleague, Daniel Hargreaves, the bat research and conservation organization known as, Trinibats. Our website: www.trinibats.com. We also manage a popular “Trinibats” facebook page which informs interested parties about our work, showcasing Trinidad and Tobago’s amazingly diverse bat fauna through photographs and educational information. The Trinibats Team conducts annual research expeditions in Trinidad, and is currently cataloging the bats of Trinidad and Tobago.

All information and images provided herein, are the intellectual property of Trinibats, and their associate researchers and photographers. Reproduction or distribution is strictly prohibited.

www.trinibats.com 1 Helping to conserve the bats of Trinidad

http://www.iucn.org

http://www.iucn.org

http://www.trinibats.com




ChiropteraMany people consider bats one thing; “if you’ve seen one bat you’ve seen them all,” is a common assumption. This, however, is far from the truth. Bats constitute 1/5 of the world’s mammalian species; there are over 1,200 different kinds. All bats are members of the mammalian order, Chiroptera, meaning, hand-wing. Bats are the only mammals capable of true flight. A bat’s wing consists of skin membrane wrapped around the upper arm, forearm, wrist, and hand of the animal. The bones of the hand and the four finger bones are greatly elongated but light and slender, providing support and flexibility to the wing membrane in flight. The bat uses the sharp, exposed claw of its thumb to cling to surfaces or, along with the hand-wing, to maneuver a fruit or other food item while hanging upside down. The hand-wing for which bats are named, is the one attribute all the world’s bats have in common.

There are two suborders of bats in the world, the Megachiroptera, and the Microchiroptera. The flying foxes (so called because of their dog-like faces) of Africa, India, Australia, etc, are members of the Megachiroptera. These bats, for the most part, do not echolocate. The bats of Central / South America, and Trinidad and Tobago, are members of the Microchiroptera, a separate and distinct suborder. We should not confuse the two suborders, because they behave quite differently. Microchiropteran bats like ours do echolocate, and that’s why many of our bats have strange appendages on their faces; that’s just the sonar equipment and gadgets they need for the serious business of navigating and foraging in the dark, and not crashing into things. Our bats are diverse, and so are their diets. A few local bat species hunt frogs, fish, rodents, and even birds; two local species of bats drink the blood of mammals and birds, respectively. However, out of Trinidad and Tobago’s 67 species of Microchiropteran bats, the vast majority (95%) control insect-pests and disperse the seeds of important forest trees, including many popular (among humans) fruit trees.

Bats are Natural Insect-Pest Control AgentsInsect-eating bats consume a minimum of half their weight in potentially harmful (i.e. to humans and crops) insects every night. Most insect-eating bats in Trinidad and Tobago consume large quantities of moths, beetles, flies, cicadas, stink-bugs, and leaf hoppers (Kunz et al., 2011). An average-sized insectivorous bat at 10 - 14 grams can routinely consume hundreds of mosquito-sized insects an hour, or at least half its body weight of insects per night. A pregnant or lactating female can more than double that intake of insects to over 100% of her body weight to provide for the additional energy requirements required for pregnancy and nursing. Nonetheless, even at half its body weight, that is 5 grams of insects per night, or 1.8 kg (4 pounds) of insects per year for a single average sized bat .When you consider that the average lifespan for a bat in the wild can be 7 or 8 years, long lives for small mammals, we are talking about literally thousands of metric tons of insects being checked by bats in Trinidad and Tobago annually. The Tamana Caves




in Central Trinidad, for example, house huge populations recorded at some 11 species of bats, numbering somewhere in the vicinity of 500,000 individuals, 75% of these being insectivores. Conservatively speaking, these bats are collectively consuming a staggering 675,000 kilograms (>300,000 lbs) of insects every year. Many of these insects include moths and beetles, the larval stages of which (caterpillars and wood-borers) are known to be major threats to agriculture and commercial forestry. The significant role insectivorous bats play in agricultural pest control must be obvious, especially when these numbers are taken into consideration. Bats also feed on cockroaches, stink-bugs and katydids, or bush crickets. Studies in the United States indicate the value of insect-pest control services provided by a particular bat species also present in Trinidad, the Brazilian free-tailed bat (Tadarida brasiliensis), to agriculture, ranges from 2 - 29% of the crop. (Cleveland et al., 2006). Another recent study calculated that a colony of just 150 Brown Bats (Eptesicus sp.) consumes approximately 800,000 beetles, 158,000 leaf-hoppers, and 335,000 stink-bugs per year (Kunz et al., 2011). These studies strongly suggest that bats do indeed play a vital role in protecting crops from damage, and in reducing the costs of pesticide use to farmers and society. The critical roles played by Trinidad and Tobago's bats in mosquito pest-control and their subsequent impact on potentially deadly illnesses such as Yellow-Fever and Dengue Fever, also deserves wider recognition. The islands' numerous varieties of insect–eating bats consume so many insects; logic dictates that they must be helping to control many insect-borne diseases, including those that affect human beings directly. Eradication and prevention methods for these and emerging diseases are typically aimed at the vectors, thus insectivorous bats are an inexpensive and natural means of supporting man-made pest control efforts.

Here Are Just a Few of Trinidad and Tobago’s Many Insect-Eating Bats

DAVY’s NAKED-BACKED BAT

One of Trinidad’s many moth specialists. The larval stage of a moth is a caterpillar. As every farmer and horticulturalist knows, moth caterpillars are major pests on commercial crops. An efficient consumer of moths like the Davy’s Naked-backed Bat, therefore, should be considered a friend to all local farmers.




LITTLE MASTIFF BAT

One of our several beetle specialists. This bat species can be seen every dawn and dusk speedily traversing the open sky, sometimes careening near buildings in their quest to consume at least half their body-weight in flying insects, usually beetles, during every single outing. Beetle grubs are major agricultural pests. The Mastiff Bat is one of the bats that commonly roost under the galvanize roofing of buildings, because trees with natural folds and crevices in their trunks that usually provide their shelters, are now in very short supply.

LITTLE BIG-EARED BAT

This bat includes Bush Crickets and Cockroaches in its diet. It operates in stealth mode while hunting, keeping it’s echolocation calls to a minimum. Instead of using echolocation calls, these bats listen for their prey. They use their short, broad wings to fly slowly, as they employ their oversized ears to listen for, and home in on, the courtship calls of their insect prey, or even the footstep sounds insects make as they walk around on vegetation. Researchers from the University of Michigan found that these bats devour more bugs than birds at organic coffee plantations. Helping to control insects pests like katydids and leaf eating beetles (Williams et al., 2008).




The GREATER WHITE-LINED BAT (above) feeds on mosquito-sized insects. This bat is often seen flying up and down forest paths hunting small flying insects during the daylight hours.

Spix’s Disk-winged Bats use the moistened pads at the bases of their wrists and toes, to adhere to the inside walls of the tube-like, unfurled leaves of heliconia (seen here) and banana trees. These little bats eat at least half their weight in mosquito-sized insects every night in Trinidad.




Bats Need A Place to Rest and Reproduce

Important seed-d i s p e r s e r s a n d pollinators, these Geoffroy’s Hairy-l e g g e d B a t s i n c l u d e f r u i t , nectar, and insects in their diets. This group is roosting in a cave ceiling. C a v e s p r o v i d e good homes for some bat species

Most bat species in T&T, however, roost among the foliage of forests and gardens, not in caves. This family of Great F r u i t - e a t i n g Bats (left), with females suckling g r e y - c o l o u r e d pups, are roosting under a coconut palm. These bats a r e v e r y important seed dispersers for a huge variety of fruit trees in both islands.




Some foliage roosting species fashion “tents” by biting the midrib of leaves, forcing the sides to fold into a tent-like shelter where the bats can spend the daylight hours resting. This Gervais’s Fruit-eating Bat (above) has bitten the mid-rib of a leaf to form a “tent” where it roosts. This bat disperses the seeds of Figuier, and other canopy fig trees that are very important food sources for other local wildlife.

This bat and its relatives disperse the seeds of the important forest regenerating tree, Cecropia, or Bois Canot, and many more tree species.

Even though they are usually associated with caves, most bat species in Trinidad and Tobago do not roost in caves. The vast majority of species need tree-hollows like this one (left) in a large Silk Cotton Tree to offer them sanctuary. Whole colonies of bats have been wiped out on private land in Trinidad and Tobago over the last 60 years, legally, according to their vermin status. Large hollow trees, caves, foliage, and other roosts filled with hundreds or thousands of helpful bats have been imprudently destroyed by poison, fire, and other diabolical means on private land in T&T many times over the years, usually through an irrational fear of “vampires,” or some other ill-advised notion. Invariably, these private estates and land holdings lie adjunct to State and other lands that naturally benefit from the consistent nightly “seed rain” deposited by fruit bats, especially so on tracks of disturbed lands in desperate need of reforestation. With lifespans averaging about 8 years, bats are relatively long lived compared to other small mammals, and a single fruit bat can pollinate the flowers and plant the seeds of hundreds, if not thousands of trees in its lifetime.




Fruit and Nectar feeding bats

Pollination

It is imperative to a tree that it avoids fertilizing itself, so nectar-feeding bats like this Greater Long-tongued Bat photographed at a hummingbird feeder in Tobago, partner with many species of forest trees to ensure viable pollination of their flowers. Trees can’t walk so many “hire” bats to transport pollen from the (male) flower anthers to the (female) flower stigmas of other trees of the same species. The night-shift equivalents of hummingbirds, nectar bats insert long tongues (seen here) into flowers to collect payment (nectar) for the pollination services they provide.

When bats visit a flowering tree for nectar, they usually get covered with pollen. As this bat (left) searches the flower cluster of a Silk Cotton Tree in northwest Trinidad for nectar, its face, wings, and belly get painted bright yellow with the tree’s pollen, which the bat will then deliver to the female flower parts of another Silk Cotton Tree that is flowering at the same time. Bats also pollinate Bois Flot, Calabash, Locust, Royal Palm, Cashew, Wild Chataigne, Pois Doux, Yellow Pois, Yellow Mangue, and many more trees in Trinidad and Tobago.




Bats Are Important Seed DispersersBats plant thousands of seeds annually in Trinidad and Tobago. If you like to see trees carpeting the hillsides, then bats are working for you! Nearly all of the trees that bats pollinate and plant produce fruits that humans use; the fruit trees they plant also feed fruit-eating birds (eco-tourism benefits), agouti, lappe, quenk, deer (hunters benefit), monkeys, and other wildlife. Here are just a few of the trees bats regularly plant all over T&T: Wild Tobacco, Pomerac, Hog Plum, Carat Palm, Royal Palm, Balata, Fustic, Chenet, Serrett, Figuier, Acoma, Kiskidee, Seaside Almond, Seaside Grape, Guava, Jamaican Plum, Sugar Apple, Star Apple, Paw Paw, Sapodilla, Sacred Fig, Sour Sop, Wild Cashima, L’Epinet, Angelin, Bois Bande, Sapucaia Nut, Mammee Sapote, Tonka bean, Mango, Peewa, and many more trees.

A Great Fruit-eating Bat (Artibeus lituratus) flies off with a forest fig (Ficus spp.). Unlike birds which tend to be perching, or stationary foragers, fruit bats are mobile foragers that defecate or drop seeds in flight far away from parent trees. This is very helpful to the parent tree a n d s a p l i n g a l i k e , making bats some of the most e ff ic ien t seed dispersers of all local animals, and crucially important to the entire f o r e s t r e g e n e r a t i o n

process. Trinidad and Tobago wildlife legislation can no longer simply allow private land owners to destroy entire colonies of fruit bats, or their many insect-eating cousins, simply because people do not understand the important functions these very helpful animals perform every night. Even more sobering should be the fact that local species of bats usually produce only a single pup per season, with only one, sometimes two seasons per year, and are thus, extremely vulnerable to population crashes due to the misguided actions of human beings who do not know the crucial roles bats play in the ecology of all forest habitats in Trinidad and Tobago.




This ripe Figuier fruit (fig) dropped by a bat clearly shows its tooth impressions. Some bats swallow small seeds as they eat hanging fruit, and defecate them in flight away from the parent tree. Other bats fly with whole fruits to another tree-roost location where they eat it in safety, once again, dropping the seeds far away from the parent tree when they’ve finished eating. Sometimes bats drop seeds by mistake, as did the one carrying this Figuier fruit, before eating it. Either way, the tree

sprouts up far away from its parent, which gives the emerging sapling a better chance to germinate and grow.

Different kinds of bats play diverse roles in the ecology of tropical forests, each genus of fruit-eating or nectar-sipping bat being important to different groups of plants. The Seba's Short-tailed Fruit Bat (see below) is a vital disperser for pioneer and early successional plant species, but not necessarily to more mature forest trees. For example, Seba's Short-tailed Fruit Bats (genus, Carollia) do not tend to include figs (pictured here) in their diets, and hence are not an important factor in the dispersal ecology of this species-rich group of canopy trees. In contrast, however, some of the Seba’s Short-tailed Fruit Bat’s most common leaf-nosed relatives, bats of the genus Artibeus, which includes 3 species in Trinidad, do indeed eat figs, and disperse their seeds widely (Fleming, 1987). These fig-eating bats are, therefore, very important contributors to the dispersal ecology of this species-rich group of canopy trees collectively referred to by biologists as, figs. It is important for all Trinidadians and Tobagonians to realize how many local birds, game animals, and other fruit-eaters relish figs because it is one of the few fruit groups that are available in various stages of ripeness throughout the year in local forests. A list of animals known to feed on figs in Trinidad and Tobago would include many species, and experienced tropical birders are well aware of the attractive forces a fruiting fig tree exerts on the avifauna. A wealth of small fruit-eating birds, most of them brightly coloured, and of particular importance to the ecotourism industry, are drawn to these fruiting trees like magnets. Troops of monkeys, larger birds like pawi, corn birds, Ramier, etc., knock considerable quantities on the ground where less agile creatures like agouti, lappe, quenk, etc. also eat them (Forsyth and Miyata, 1984). Between 10 - 15 species of local fruit bats are also known to disperse the seeds of figs in Trinidad and Tobago, including the Macconnell’s Bats featured on the following page. All of these bats are helping to feed other wildlife when they disperse the seeds of fig trees.




The Macconnell's Bat

A family of Macconnell's Bats (Mesophylla macconnelli) snuggle inside a "tent" fashioned from an Anthurium leaf in the Bush Bush Sanctuary in southeast Trinidad. Efficient seed dispersers and pollinators, these bats include figs, and other fruit, pollen, and nectar in their diets.




Seba's Short-tailed Fruit Bat

The most common fruit bat in Trinidad and Tobago is a major seed disperser for many important fruit trees. As described above, this bat is a champion at reforesting disturbed areas. It is also one of the most common bats to take up residence in the ceilings and attics of abandoned or occupied houses, churches, schools, and other buildings, sometimes making life difficult for human beings. Small populations don’t do much harm really, but large populations can be a problem. There are several procedures and devices that our regional colleagues have been applying successfully over the last few years that the Trinibats Conservation Team www.trinibats.com is interested to introduce locally. These include educational programs in urban and rural communities, focusing on bat-proofing procedures for new and renovated buildings. For situations where buildings are already occupied by bats, and aside from the strategic sealing of potential access points, we would advise the installation of bat-exclusion devices (BEDs), which are designed and constructed specifically for the particular situation, that allow the bats safe passage out of the building at night, but prevent their ability to re-enter the area. Following, or in tandem with evictions of this kind, artificial “bat houses” are installed at the top of tall poles high off the ground and away from buildings; these ‘bat houses” give the bats somewhere else to go. The bats are not simply evicted then, but also provided an appropriate place to roost, and still go about their business of eating insects and planting trees during the night without making nuisances of themselves. A win win for all involved, except the insects.

At left (below), a Seba’s Short-tailed Fruit Bat chews fruit as it flies away to widely scatter the seeds of a guava tree in a Trinidad forest. At right, a female Seba’s suckles her pup at her breast.






Some more interesting local bats

A strobe-lit Greater F i s h i n g B a t i s p h o t o g r a p h e d capturing a fish with i t s c l a w e d f e e t , transferring it to its mouth, then flying off to a night roost to eat it in safety. Greater Fishing Bats also hunt insects in the forest at night.

Greater Fishing Bats are indigenous to both Trinidad and Tobago

The hole at the base of this termite nest at left (below) has been carved by a male Pygmy Round-eared Bat to provide a shelter for his family. You can see the family group peeping out of the hole in the image at right. Pygmy Round-eared Bats eat grasshoppers, bush-crickets, cockroaches, and other insects. Photographed in the Bush Bush Sanctuary, SE Trinidad.




Fruit Bats and Fruit Farmers:

The so-called “fruit-orchard pest” accusations commonly leveled at local fruit bats are simply not accurate. Local species of fruit bats find fruit by smell not by vision, and only ripe fruits emit a scent; no serious fruit farmer is going to leave his commercial harvest to ripen on a tree when it would by then be far too late to bring to market. Much of the negative reflex responses of fruit farmers to fruit bats are based on misinformation and superstition. Many people also confuse the behaviour of local fruit bats with that of Old World fruit bats, commonly known as “flying foxes.” The flying foxes of Africa, India, Australia, etc., do not echolocate and are visually oriented animals; their behaviour is, therefore, very different to that of the fruit bats from Trinidad and Tobago that generally localize fruit by using their sense of smell. The wildlife conservation laws of Trinidad and Tobago must no longer be guided by misinformation and misunderstandings that have nothing to do with how local bats behave. The ecology of both islands suffers when bat conservation is ignored.

Bats Are Not Disease Carrying Pests:

Records of bat disease transmission in Trinidad and Tobago are rare, with perhaps one exception, paralytic rabies. The implication of vampire bats (Desmodus rotundus) in rabies virus transmission is well documented in Trinidad, but not Tobago as this island is vampire bat free. The Anti-Rabies Unit of the Ministry of Food Production functions to keep this disease under control by culling of the vampire bat population, an activity which has been conducted since the 1930’s. However, since then the rabies virus positivity rates for this species has declined from roughly 3% to less than 1% (Seetahal, Veterinary Diagnostic Laboratory. personal communication, 2013). Nevertheless, due to the association between the vampire bat and rabies, unfortunately all bats have been stigmatized as deadly disease carriers and vermin.

On the other hand, ironically, recent evidence suggests that vampire culling actually has the opposite undesired effect of increasing the prevalence of the rabies virus in the affected colonies (Streicker et al; 2012). Additionally, it is well noted that one of the major factors that account for zoonotic disease (disease transmissible from animal to human) transmission is the encroachment of humans into forested areas with disruption of animal habitats and animal displacement forcing increased animal to human contact.

The “House Bats” Problem:

As stated previously, the biggest problem bats pose in Trinidad and Tobago is their propensity for roosting inside people’s homes, or in churches, schools, and other buildings. Small colonies of bats living under a galvanize roof really do not pose a problem, but bats living inside ceilings, or people’s living quarters should not be tolerated. They don’t belong there; bats should have their own roosts. The solution to these problems lies in education, and proper building and repair practices. There are methods of “house bat” eviction, including the installing of devices to ensure their continued exclusion that our colleagues in the region have been using successfully for the last few years. Further, following all evictions from buildings, artificial bat houses are installed high off the ground so the bats have somewhere else to go. The Trinibats team is interested to introduce these procedures and devices to Trinidad and Tobago; however, it is difficult to source funding for bat conservation projects such as these when the laws of the land still designate bats as vermin. The vermin status bats have suffered under for the last 60 years has done nothing to alleviate the “house bat” problem in T&T. The Trinibats Team, suggests another approach; one that works for human communities, for the bats, and for the health of our forest habitats and wildlife.




Bats maintain healthy forest habitats “For this alone, they deserve protection”

Bats consume the infructescence of Cecropia, or Bois Canot, digest pulp derived from the enlarged, fleshy perianth, and defecate the fruits. Passage through the bat’s gut removes the perianth and all or part of the mucilaginous (sticky) layer surrounding the fruit of Cecropia, thereby reducing the adhesion of fruits with one another. Thus, because bats defecate in flight, the fruits from a single defecation are spread over an extended area of forest floor. Therefore, bat dispersal of Cecropia provides efficient dissemination into large gaps and primary forest. Though bat dispersal is not necessary for seed germination, the process of passing through the bat’s gut increases seed survival and subsequent germination. Fruit structure plays a significant role in seed longevity, and seeds build up over time in a ‘seed bank’ on the forest floor.

This photograph (above) illustrates how fruit bats repair a patch of damaged forest. Undisturbed Seasonal Evergreen Forest in northeast Trinidad, can be seen behind the orange blossoming Immortelles. In front of the Immortelles (Erythrina sp.) from left to right can be seen the area that had been cleared only months before of mature forest similar to the unbroken jungle behind the flowering Immortelles. All of the trees in the foreground, in front of the Immortelles, are pioneer species (Bois Canot or Cecropia), that have sprouted from seeds deposited by fruit bats. The other tall tree in front of the Immortelle at left is also a pioneer species (Bois Flot or Balsa), with seeds dispersed by the wind, but with flowers that are pollinated by bats in search of nectar.




Fruit bats and Reforestation

One of the most important ecological roles played by Cecropia, or Bois Canot, is as pioneer plants in disturbed areas. An individual Cecropia can yield fruits for 4–5 months, and some species of the genus produce seeds capable of germinating after 4 or 5 years of dormancy; this is the significance of the nightly “seed-rain” delivered by fruit bats. As a result of this productivity, seeds of Cecropia are often the most common in soil seed banks in both primary and secondary forests; in some cases, constituting 50% of the soil seed bank in some areas. Because of the abundance of seeds in the soil, as well as the rapid dispersal of them by fruit bats into newly disturbed areas, regeneration of forests in gaps is facilitated by species of Cecropia, Bois Canot, throughout most of Trinidad and Tobago.

Crucially, the trees of Cecropia often produce the first shade and litter which enables later successional species to germinate and establish seedlings in disturbed areas. Although Cecropia species have little economic value, they appear to play an essential role in initial stages of plant succession after disturbance; Cecropia, or Bois Canot, often provide the microhabitat needed for the growth of economically important food and timber trees, thus regenerating important canopy species like Crappo, Cedar, Cypre, Guatecare, etc. Some of the local bats known to disperse Cecropia, or Bois Canot, in T&T, are Artibeus jamaicensis, Carollia perspicillata, and Platyrrhinus helleri. Other larger bats play an important role in moving the diaspores of secondary forest species into primary forest and in transporting the larger seeds of primary forest into secondary forest. The Great Fruit-eating Bat, Artibeus lituratus, for example (described above), consumes the seeds of secondary forest species, as well as the fruits of the primary forest species. The seeds of these species are relatively large, but this bat is capable of transporting fruits and seeds almost as large as it is.

Cecropia, or Bois Canot, have evolved features that allow them to remain dormant in the soil seed bank until conditions become favorable for seed germination. These features make it possible for species of Cecropia to play an essential role in forest regeneration after disturbance. The occurrence of stands of bat-dispersed Cecropia in many large and small gaps throughout the Neotropics reflects the fruit adaptations of this ecologically successful pioneer species (Lobova et al., 2003). Moreover, since bats disperse more seeds than birds (primarily to disturbed areas and consisting primarily of pioneer species), they are likely to play an important role in successional and restoration processes among habitats as structurally and vegetationally different as, old fields, cacao plantations, and forest (Medellin and Gaona, 1999)




Conclusion - Bats Need Protection95% of Trinidad and Tobago’s bats are important natural pest-control agents, and highly effective pollinators and seed dispersers. Many insectivores consume between 50% - 125 % of their body-weight in insects every night. These insects include many types of moths, the larval stages of which (caterpillars) are great agricultural pests. Insects taken include huge amounts of beetles, the larval stages of which are wood-borers and similarly destructive pests to agriculture and forestry. Many bats also consume huge quantities of bush crickets, flying termites and ants (rainflies), cockroaches, bush bugs, and mosquitoes. And, as everybody knows, mosquitoes are potential carriers of diseases that can be deadly to human beings.

Many of Trinidad & Tobago's bats are fruit-eaters, responsible for more seed dispersal in tropical forest systems than birds, or any other animal agents for that matter. Their unique lifestyle involving defecation in flight while commuting between their feeding grounds and day roosts, places bats among the most effective long distance dispersers of tropical seeds. The most common fruit bat in Trinidad is Seba’s Short-tailed Fruit Bat (Carollia perspicillata). A single Seba’s Short-tailed Fruit Bat can disperse as many as 60,000 fruit seeds in one night, with each square meter of forest floor receiving between 12 and 80 seeds annually (Fleming, 1988). Bats play diverse roles in the ecology of Trinidad and Tobago’s forests, and each genus of fruit or nectar feeding bat is important to different groups of plants. Studies conducted in Trinidad and elsewhere indicate that frugivorous bats play an extremely important role in the regeneration of forests in disturbed habitats, and help to maintain plant species richness in tropical forests (Fleming, 1988). Nectivorous and frugivorous bats also play important roles in the pollination of many important flowering trees and shrubs in Trinidad and Tobago's forests.

Yet, these highly efficient insect-controllers, seed-dispersers, and flower-pollinators, enjoy little or no protection in these islands. Worse, according to the Trinidad and Tobago Conservation of Wild life Act of 1958 (Chapter 76:01), all bats are categorized as “vermin.” Creatures designated vermin can be legally destroyed on private land, whether they are individuals or entire colonies. For all bats to be considered vermin in this day and age is to ignore all evidence to the contrary regarding their ecology and behavior as has been uncovered over the last half century. Moreover, since fruit-eating bats together with insectivorous bats (i.e. 95% of T&T bats) are now fully protected in most countries of the world, this law is clearly out of step with current international norms in this regard. Further, while T&T laws still list bats as vermin, the fact that bats are now fully protected by the Wildlife Protection Act, administered by the Natural Resources Conservation Authority of Jamaica, should be enough to elicit a review of our current legislation.

Herein, we hope to have made a convincing case for the removal of bats from the list of vermin species in the new wildlife legislation being considered for Trinidad and Tobago. Vampire bat population controls should remain the purview of NADC. Private land owners should report bat roost concerns for confirmation of vampires, not be legally entitled to destroy helpful bat species.

Geoffrey Gomes Daniel HargreavesTrinibats Co-founder Trinibats Co-founderIUCN - Bat Specialist IUCN Bat Red List Authority




Bibliography

Dalling, James W., and Thomas A. Brown. "Long-Term Persistence of Pioneer Species in Tropical Rain Forest Soil Seed Banks." The American Naturalist 173.4 (2009): 531-535. Department of Plant Biology, University of Illinois, Urbana, IL 61801, USA.

Fleming, Theodore H. Fruit Bats: Prime Movers of Tropical Seeds. Bats. Volume 5, No. 3 Fall 1987

Fleming, Theodore H. The short-tailed fruit bat: a study in plant-animal interactions. University of Chicago Press, 1988.

Forsyth, Adrian. and Miyata, Kenneth. Tropical nature / Adrian Forsyth and Kenneth Miyata ; illustrations by Sarah Landry Scribner, New York : 1984

Kunz, Thomas H., et al. "Ecosystem services provided by bats." Annals of the New York Academy of Sciences 1223.1 (2011): 1-38.

Lobova, Tatyana A., et al. "Cecropia as a food resource for bats in French Guiana and the significance of fruit structure in seed dispersal and longevity." American Journal of Botany 90.3 (2003): 388-403.

Medellin, R. A. and Gaona, O. (1999), Seed Dispersal by Bats and Birds in Forest and Disturbed Habitats of Chiapas, Mexico. Biotropica, 31: 478–485. doi: 10.1111/j.1744-7429.1999.tb00390.x

Streicker et al; (2012) ecological and antrhropogenic drivers of rabies exposure in vampire bats: implications for transmission and control. Proc. R. Soc. B published online 13 June 2012.

Williams-Guillen, K., I. Perfecto & J. Vandermeer. 2008. Bats limit insects in a neotropical agroforestry system. Science320:70.

www.trinibats.com Helping to conserve the bats of Trinidad



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