Animal Info - Flower-faced Bat

(Other Names: Kengki, Mutukenu, Solomons Horseshoe Bat)

Anthops ornatus

Status: Vulnerable

1. Profile
2. Tidbits
3. Status and Trends (IUCN Status, Countries Where Currently Found, History of Distribution, Threats and Reasons for Decline)
4. Data on Biology and Ecology (Size and Weight, Habitat, Diet)
5. References

Profile

The flower-faced bat is a small, distinctive horseshoe bat with an orange-yellow nose-leaf. The length of its head and body total about 5 cm (2"). One male weighed 8 g (0.3 oz). The flower-faced bat is found from sea level to 200 m (660') throughout its range. It occurs in rain forest, but will also fly around village houses. It probably eats insects picked off of foliage.

The flower-faced bat occurs on the islands of Choiseul, Florida, Guadalcanal and Santa Isabel in the Solomon Islands, as well as on the island of Bougainville between the Solomon Islands and Papua New Guinea. It occurs in a region subject to increasing habitat disruption.

Tidbits

*** The name "horseshoe" bat comes from the fact that the lower part of the nose-leaf, which covers the upper lip and around the nostrils, is horseshoe-shaped in these bats.

*** Etymology of the scientific name of the flower-faced bat: genus name - "flower-face" (Greek), a reference to the ornate nose-leaf; species name - "ornate" (Latin) a further reference to the nose-leaf (Flannery 1995a).

Status and Trends

IUCN Status:

1996 - 2004: Vulnerable (Criteria: A2c, D2) (Population Trend: Decreasing) (IUCN 2004)

Countries Where the Flower-faced Bat Is Currently Found:

2004: Occurs in Papua New Guinea and the Solomon Islands (IUCN 2004).

History of Distribution:

Location Map (131 Kb JPEG) (Univ. Texas/Maps)

Threats and Reasons for Decline:

The flower-faced bat occurs in a region subject to increasing habitat disruption (Nowak 1999).

Data on Biology and Ecology

Size and Weight:

The length of the flower-faced bat's head and body is about 5 cm (2"). One male weighed 8 g (0.3 oz). (Flannery 1995a)

Habitat:

The flower-faced bat is found from sea level to 200 m (660') throughout its range. It occurs in rain forest, but will also fly around village houses. (Bonaccorso 1998)

The flower-faced bat is one of the species that live in both the East Melanesian Islands Biodiversity Hotspot (Cons. Intl. 2005) and the Solomons-Vanuatu-Bismarck Moist Forests Global 200 Ecoregion (Olson & Dinerstein 1998, Olson & Dinerstein 1999).

Diet:

The flower-faced bat probably eats insects picked off of foliage (Bonaccorso 1998).

References

Bonaccorso 1998, Cons. Intl. 2005, Flannery 1995a, IUCN 1996, IUCN 2000, IUCN 2003a, IUCN 2004, Nowak 1999, Univ. Texas/Maps

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Last modified: March 5, 2005;