Refine
Document Type
- Article (1)
- Part of Periodical (1)
Language
- English (2) (remove)
Has Fulltext
- yes (2) (remove)
Is part of the Bibliography
- no (2)
Keywords
- Chiroptera (2) (remove)
In 1966, Robert William Hayman, Xavier Misonne and Walter Verheyen published their listing of the Congolese, Rwandan and Burundian bat specimens in the collections in the museums of Tervuren, Brussels, Geneva, London and New York. In the fifty years that have passed since, some major changes have been introduced in the taxonomy of the Chiroptera: new species have been discovered, species have been split off, species have been moved to other genera, and additional material has been collected. We re-evaluated the data presented by Hayman et al., and supplemented this with specimen records found in the literature and in online catalogs. This resulted in 136 species, represented by 20 231 specimens (compared to 113 species and 8567 specimens originally). When available, we also recorded additional information such as locality, sex and age, collector, collection date and preservation type of the voucher specimen. The distribution maps of the Congolese taxa are revised to represent the current taxonomy, and are presented in perspective against the taxon’s Species Distribution Model to assess species distribution on the African continent. Additionally, an updated key to the various taxa is presented.
First record of Straw-coloured fruit bat Eidolon helvum (Kerr, 1792) for the Cape Verde Islands
(2010)
On 8 September 2010, at 9:45 AM, a fruit bat was seen flying at a height of ca. 2 m over the sea off Ervatão, southeastern Boavista, Cape Verde Islands (16º 02’ N, 22º 41’ W). After a while, the animal landed in the beach vegetation. When captured, it did not offer any resistance to being handled and it was taken to the nearby sea turtle station, operated by the NGO Cabo Verde Natura 2000. The bat – which proved to be a female – was placed in an improvised cage made of plastic netting where it eagerly fed on the food provided, i.e. tomato, apple and banana. At 16:00 PM, the following biometric data were taken: head width 31.6 mm, humerus 81.1 mm, ulna 121.2 mm, tarsus 49.7 mm. When restrained for taking body measurements, the bat attempted to defend itself with its mouth.