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Integrative and Comparative Biology Advance Access originally published online on June 4, 2008
Integrative and Comparative Biology 2008 48(1):107-118; doi:10.1093/icb/icn033
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© The Author 2008. Published by Oxford University Press on behalf of the Society for Integrative and Comparative Biology. All rights reserved. For permissions please email: journals.permissions@oxfordjournals.org.

This article appears in the following Integrative and Comparitive Biology issue: Aeroecology: Probing and Modeling the Aerosphere–The Next Frontier [View the issue table of contents]

Brazilian free-tailed bats (Tadarida brasiliensis: Molossidae, Chiroptera) at high altitude: links to migratory insect populations

Gary F. McCracken1,*, Erin H. Gillam2,*, John K. Westbrook{dagger}, Ya-Fu Lee3,*, Michael L. Jensen{ddagger} and Ben B. Balsley{ddagger}
*Department of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology, University of Tennessee, Knoxville, TN 37996-1610, USA; {dagger}United States Department of Agriculture—Agricultural Research Service, 2771 F&B Road, College Station, Texas, 77845, USA; {ddagger}Cooperative Institute for Research in Environmental Sciences, University of Colorado, Boulder, CO 80309, USA

Correspondence: 1E-mail: gmccrack{at}utk.edu

Existing information on the activity of bats in the aerosphere is restricted almost exclusively to altitudes that are within a few tens of meters above the ground. We report a total of 50.2 h of ultrasonic recordings made using radio microphonic bat detectors suspended from free-floating helium balloons and from kites. The data include a total of 22 353 echolocative calls from ground-level to 1118 m above ground level (AGL). These calls are attributed to Brazilian free-tailed bats based on acoustic features and the large numbers and high-altitude aerial dispersion of these bats over the local landscape. Bat activity varied significantly throughout the air column and was greatest at 400–500 m AGL and near ground level. Feeding buzzes, indicating feeding on aerial prey, were most abundant near ground level and at 400–500 m, and were detected to altitudes of ~ 900 m AGL. The peak activity of bats at 400–500 m AGL is concordant with the altitude of the atmospheric boundary layer and the seasonal formation of the low-elevation southerly wind jet that has been identified as a major aeroecological corridor for the nocturnal dispersal of noctuid moths and other insects.

From the symposium "Aeroecology: Probing and Modeling the Aerosphere—The Next Frontier" presented at the annual meeting of the Society for Integrative and Comparative Biology, January 2–6, 2008, at San Antonio, Texas.

2Present address: Department of Biology, University of Regina, Regina, SK S4S 0A2, Canada

3Present address: Department of Life Sciences and Institute of Biodiversity, National Cheng Kung University, Tainan 701, Taiwan


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