AT A GLANCE
- Common Name: Heart-nosed Bat
- Scientific Name: Cardioderma cor
- Category: Mammals
- Subcategory: Bats
- Range: Eastern Africa, native to Ethiopia, Somalia, Kenya, eastern Uganda, Tanzania, and northeastern Sudan
- Habitat Type: Arid and semi-arid lowlands, thorn scrub savannas, dry river valleys, coastal thickets, and acacia woodlands with caves, baobab hollows, or abandoned buildings for roosting
- IUCN Red List Status: Least Concern
- Lifespan: 6 to 10 years
- Diet: Carnivorous/Insectivorous (large terrestrial beetles, crickets, scorpions, small frogs, geckos, and other smaller bats caught by gleaning)
- Average Size/Weight: Head-and-body length 70 to 85 mm; wingspan 30 to 38 cm; weight 20 to 35 g
- Key Defining Feature: Tail-less false vampire bat with huge translucent ears joined across the forehead, pale blue-grey fur, and an upright fleshy noseleaf shaped like a perfect heart
Overview
The Heart-nosed Bat (Cardioderma cor) is a fascinating, carnivorous false vampire bat in the family Megadermatidae, native to the arid bushlands of East Africa. Instantly recognizable by the distinct, fleshy heart-shaped noseleaf perched above its nostrils and its immense, sensitive ears, this extraordinary mammal is one of the few bat species known to hunt small terrestrial vertebrates. In addition to its predatory prowess, it is renowned among mammalogists for its elaborate, complex vocal ‘singing’ used to defend feeding territories under the African night sky.
Biology and Physical Characteristics
Cardioderma cor has a soft, dense, pale blue-grey to silvery-ash dorsal pelage that transitions to a lighter whitish-grey on the underbelly. It completely lacks an external tail, with its broad interfemoral flight membrane supported by long calcars. Its most distinctive physical characteristic is its prominent, erect noseleaf, whose upper section forms a crisp, rounded, heart-shaped structure used to direct low-frequency echolocation calls. Its enormous, translucent ears are fused at the base across the crown of the head, giving the bat exceptional auditory sensitivity capable of detecting the sound of a beetle crawling across dry leaves.
Behavior and Ecology
Unlike insectivorous aerial hawkers that catch flying insects on the wing, the Heart-nosed Bat is a dedicated perch hunter and substrate gleaner. Hanging motionless from an acacia branch, it rotates its head and large ears to listen for faint terrestrial rustling below. Upon pinpointing prey, it swoops down, pounces onto the ground, and secures its victim before carrying it back up to a feeding roost. Uniquely, territorial individuals establish singing perches in trees during the dry season, broadcasting rhythmic, multi-note melodic song bouts audible to the human ear to declare territory boundaries and deter rival foragers.
Conservation and Human Impact
The Heart-nosed Bat is listed as Least Concern on the IUCN Red List. It has a relatively wide distribution across the Horn of Africa and East Africa and maintains stable populations where roosting sites in caves, hollow baobab trunks, and culverts remain undisturbed. Localized threats stem from habitat disturbance, bush clearing, and roost eradication.
Interesting Factoid
The Heart-nosed Bat is one of the rare ‘singing bats’ of Africa, perching in acacia trees at night to broadcast melodic acoustic songs that warn other bats to stay out of its hunting territory.