Sulawesi stripe-faced fruit bat

Sulawesi stripe-faced fruit bat

Wallace's

Kingdom
Phylum
Subphylum
Class
Order
Family
Genus
SPECIES
Styloctenium wallacei

The Wallace's or Sulawesi stripe-faced fruit bat (Styloctenium wallacei ) is a species of megabat in the family Pteropodidae. It is endemic to Sulawesi and the nearby Togian Islands of Indonesia. Cave paintings resembling these bats have been found in Australia, where bats of this kind are not otherwise known.

Appearance

The Sulawesi stripe-faced fruit bat is a typical fruit bat with long, naked ears, forearms modified for flight and short hind legs with claws. There are white facial markings, each with a dark brown margin; a streak on the rostrum, a spot on the cheek, another at the angle of the jaw, a patch over the eye, a band across the upper lip and a patch on the chin. The only other known species of the genus Styloctenium, S. mindorensis, is differentiated by its multicusped lower and upper canine teeth.

Distribution

Geography

Continents
Countries
Regions
Biogeographical realms

The Sulawesi stripe-faced fruit bat is native to the island of Sulawesi in the Greater Sunda Islands and the Togian Islands in the Gulf of Tomini. It inhabits primary forest at altitudes of up to about 1,100 m (3,600 ft) but sometimes occurs in secondary forest where the understorey has been cleared to make way for cultivation of coffee or cocoa. When it is occasionally seen in more open areas, it is probably moving between fragmented patches of forest. Cave paintings of megabats, found near Kimberley in Australia, are unlike any bats living on that continent today; they more resemble the Sulawesi stripe-faced fruit bat than any other species. A fossilised wasp nest overlaying cave paintings of a similar type has been tested as being 17,500 years old, making the rock art older and maybe dating to the last ice age, some twenty to twenty-five thousand years ago.

Sulawesi stripe-faced fruit bat habitat map
Sulawesi stripe-faced fruit bat habitat map
Sulawesi stripe-faced fruit bat
Attribution-ShareAlike License

Population

Population number

The Sulawesi stripe-faced fruit bat is common in some areas of the island but rare in others. Much of the primary forest on Sulawesi has been cleared for agriculture, and the population of the bat is thought to be declining, and it may be hunted in some areas. For these reasons, the International Union for Conservation of Nature has assessed its conservation status as being "near threatened". It is present in the Lore Lindu National Park in Central Sulawesi.

Coloring Pages

References

1. Sulawesi stripe-faced fruit bat Wikipedia article - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sulawesi_stripe-faced_fruit_bat
2. Sulawesi stripe-faced fruit bat on The IUCN Red List site - https://www.iucnredlist.org/species/21100/9245667

More Fascinating Animals to Learn About