Daubenton's Bat

Fascinating facts about the Daubenton's Bat

• A Daubenton's bat fits on a fingertip, measuring just 45 to 55 mm from nose to tail, yet its wings stretch 240 to 275 mm, about the length of a school ruler, allowing it to hover like a hummingbird over water. It weighs only 7 to 15 g, roughly the mass of a handful of pennies, which lets it stay aloft on the tiniest insect swarms. This tiny aerodynamic package lets the bat skim water surfaces at night, turning every ripple into a hunting ground and showing how evolution can pack high-speed flight into a pocket-sized body.
• When dusk falls, a Daubenton's bat launches a sonar burst that sweeps from 32 to 85 kHz, with most calls peaking at 45 to 50 kHz and lasting just 3.3 ms, shorter than a blink. This high-frequency echo lets it detect insects hovering just centimeters above water. After a one-hour feast, a 7-gram bat can weigh 11 g, a 57 % boost, showing how efficiently it converts captured prey into fuel for nightly foraging. The rapid weight gain underscores the bat's role as a powerhouse insect predator in riparian ecosystems.
• Daubenton's bats span the whole Palearctic, from Ireland in the west to Hokkaido in the east, and even reach Japan and Korea, covering latitudes from 63 °N in Scandinavia down to 40 °N in Greece. They cling to water-rich landscapes, lakes, ponds, streams, and roost in trees, bridges, or caves near these habitats. Their preference for still water lets them hunt midges that swarm above the surface, linking healthy waterways to thriving bat colonies.
• During winter hibernation, a Daubenton's bat drops its skin temperature to just 8.9-10.2 °C and its heart thumps at a slow 108-120 beats per minute. When it awakens, the temperature spikes to 36.5-37.6 °C and the heart races to 450-750 beats per minute.
• One Daubenton's bat has outlived most of its kind, reaching an estimated 22 years in the wild. In Finland, a male named Nestori has been monitored since 2008 and was about 21 years old in 2024.

Sources

Every fact above was checked against these pages, and kept only where one of them states it.

• Wikipedia
• Animal Diversity Web

At a glance

About the Daubenton's Bat

As dusk falls over the tranquil waters, a tiny, winged silhouette emerges from the shadows, Daubenton's bat taking to the evening air with an effortless flutter of its leathery wings, its high-pitched calls echoing across the landscape as it embarks on a nocturnal hunt for insects. With an agility that belies its small size, the bat dances through the darkness, its echolocation cries painting a sonic picture of the world around it, a remarkable symphony of sound and motion that orchestrates its every move. In this fleeting, moonlit world, Daubenton's bat reigns supreme, a master of the night, its delicate form a testament to the wonders of evolutionary adaptation.

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