US Fish & Wildlife Service
Date of this Version
1-4-1971
Citation
U.S. Government Work
Abstract
Considerable interest has developed in recent years with regard to studies of wing areas and wing loadings of North American bats (Davis and Cockrum, 19645; Jones, 1967; Davis, 1969; Farney and Fleharty, 1969). To our knowledge, such data have not been presented for Plecotus rafinesquii, one of the least known of North American species (Barbour and Davis, 1969). The purpose of this report is to provide information on flight of P. rafinesquii species, as well as adults of two other species of Plecotus.
Seventy-one P. rafinesquii were studied: five were banded and released and 66 were preserved either as skins and skulls or in fluid and deposited in the United States National Museum (USNM) or in the Vertebrate Collections of Tulane University (TU). The animals were observed and collected 12 mi. W Woodville, Wilkson Co., Mississippi, on 11 June 1970 (29 USNM, 29 TU) and on the Riverside Campus of Tulane University, Plaquemines Parish, Louisiana, on 30 June and 31 July 1970 (8 TU). At the former locality bats were found in an abandoned house; at the latter site animals were located beneath old ammunition-storage bunkers.
Comments
Journal of Mammalogy, Vol. 52, No. 2 (May, 1971), pp. 458-460