Image source:www.bats.org.utc/pages/a_year_in_the_life_of_a_bat.html
Bats during Winters : Hibernation
Can you recall one of the things we said when we were talking about mammals?
Bat is a mammal who are warm – blooded creatures. They need to eat a lot of food to keep their body warm.
What does the bat do when he doesn’t find any insect? How does he keep himself warm?
A bat goes into hibernation. It is a long sleep which can last for months. Bats go to hibernation in caves, between rocks or tree hollows. You will find them sleeping upside down in a dense packed group in which there are hundreds of bats in a square foot. Bats often come back to same cave for hibernation every year.
When a bat hibernates, its body temperature drops until it comes close to the temperature outside. In other words, he becomes as cold as his surroundings. Their heart beat also slows down to about 20 times per minute. Their body doesn’t need much food to maintain the heat. They can do so for five – six months by using a few grams of the food they store in their body. When they come out of hibernation, they lose a quarter to half of their body weight and looking much thinner.
If bats are disturbed during hibernation, they wake up and fly weakly for a while. This uses up their stored food and they may even die. So, hibernating bats should be left alone.
Some of the bats hibernate and some migrate.
Let us find out what is Migration .
