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According to the
Animal Diversity Web
Thailand's bumblebee bat (a.k.a. Kitti's hognosed bat
or
Craseonycteris thonglongyai)
competes with the
Etruscan pygmy shrew for the title of world's smallest mammal.
At issue is whether skull size or mass defines "smallest";
shrews are lighter but the bumblebee's
skull, shown right, is smaller at 11mm.These bats are so-named since they're about the size of a bumblebee, weigh about as much as a dime, and have the ability to hover like hummingbirds. Their roosting habitat consists of the hot upper chambers of caves in limestone hills. They are most active at dusk when they fly around the tops of bamboo clumps and teak trees to feed on insects.
While bumblebee roosts in colonies, an individual is solitary. Though close to others in its group, it hangs alone, rather than clustering tightly. Due to its tiny size, and its predilection for separation from the rest of the population, the bumblebee bat is the perfect symbol of a BAyesian Treatment learner.
The bumblebee's fame far exceeds their size. Cuter than a button but less glamorous than, say, blood-feeding vampire bats, only the bumbleebee's extreme size ensures a cult following. No survey of terrestrial bats is complete without a reference to the humble bumble. Little girls around the globe adore the bumblebee (e.g. http://kids-learn.org/stellaluna/florin.htm). (Predictably, bumblebees don't attract little boys who seem to prefer ghoulishly fantasizing about the dripping fangs of vampires.)
Sadly, the bats are small both in size and in number. The species was unknown prior to 1974 and is found only in the Karmhanaburi Province in Western Thailand. Their habitat has been highly affected by deforestation and unsustainable levels of teak logging. In 1982, the Royal Forest Department of the Thailand Government could only found 160 of them living in 3 caves, despite extensive surveys.
Bumblebee bats are are now considered one of the twelve most endangered species on the planet (see https://ecos.fws.gov/docs/frdocs/1984/84-1721.pdf). On the web, I can't find any report of their numbers since the 1982 survey. Currently, bumblebees may only exist on the web pages of young girls.
Tim Menzies ,
tim@menzies.us,
http://menzies.us
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