It is hard to guess what a Madagascar sucker-footed bat weights. But we have the answer:
An adult Madagascar sucker-footed bat (Myzopoda aurita) on average weights 9 grams (0.02 lbs).
The Madagascar sucker-footed bat is from the family Myzopodidae (genus: Myzopoda). When reaching adult age, they grow up to 5.8 cm (0′ 3″).
As a reference: An average human weights in at 62 kg (137 lbs) and reaches an average size of 1.65m (5′ 5″). Humans spend 280 days (40 weeks) in the womb of their mother and reach around 75 years of age.
The Madagascar sucker-footed bat, Old World sucker-footed bat, or simply sucker-footed bat (Myzopoda aurita) is a species of bat in the family Myzopodidae endemic to Madagascar, especially in the eastern part of the forests. The genus was thought to be monospecific until a second species, Myzopoda schliemanni, was discovered in the central western lowlands. It was classified as Vulnerable in the 1996 IUCN Red List of Threatened Species but is now known to be more abundant and was reclassified in 2008 as of “Least Concern”.The bat is named for the presence of small cups on its wrists and ankles. They roost inside the rolled leaves of the traveller’s tree, using their suckers to attach themselves to the smooth surface. Despite the name, it is now known that the bats do not use suction to attach themselves to roost sites, but instead use a form of wet adhesion by secreting a body fluid at their pads. The ankle and wrist pads of the bat are controlled by muscle contraction and allow the bat to separate the pads to reduce the adhesive effect. This allows the bats to climb with ease and to remove themselves from surfaces after sticking. Due to this property the Madagascar sucker-footed bat is one of the few bat species that roosts with its head up rather than upside down. This is so the bat does not accidentally lose control of the adhesive pads while it is sleeping due to the muscle tension associated with roosting upside down.Because of their unique habitat, sucker-footed bats don’t carry ectoparasites, due to the smooth surface of the Ravenala leaves being inhospitable to small arthropods The majority of sucker-footed bats caught in eastern Madagascar were within or close to stands of traveller’s trees, and according to research, the maximum distance they will travel while foraging is about 1.8 km (1.1 mi). Sucker-footed bats feed largely on beetles and small moths.
Animals with the same weight as a Madagascar sucker-footed bat
As a comparison, here are some other animals that weight as much as the Myzopoda aurita:
- Micronycteris nicefori bringing 8 grams to the scale
- Western long-tongued bat bringing 8 grams to the scale
- Bourret’s horseshoe bat bringing 8 grams to the scale
- Bates’s slit-faced bat bringing 10 grams to the scale
- Noack’s roundleaf bat bringing 10 grams to the scale
- Gray climbing mouse bringing 9 grams to the scale
- Damara woolly bat bringing 10 grams to the scale
- Eastern harvest mouse bringing 8 grams to the scale
- Shamel’s horseshoe bat bringing 9 grams to the scale
- Crosse’s shrew bringing 8 grams to the scale
Animals with the same size as a Madagascar sucker-footed bat
Not that size really matters, but it makes things comparable. So here are a couple of animals that are as big as Madagascar sucker-footed bat:
- Cuban flower bat with a size of 6.3 cm (0′ 3″)
- Lesser bulldog bat with a size of 6.6 cm (0′ 3″)
- Pacific sheath-tailed bat with a size of 4.7 cm (0′ 2″)
- Sundevall’s roundleaf bat with a size of 5.4 cm (0′ 3″)
- Underwood’s long-tongued bat with a size of 5.9 cm (0′ 3″)
- Mexican long-tongued bat with a size of 6.6 cm (0′ 3″)
- Allen’s big-eared bat with a size of 5.9 cm (0′ 3″)
- Lowe’s shrew with a size of 6.9 cm (0′ 3″)
- Balochistan gerbil with a size of 6.3 cm (0′ 3″)
- Ghost-faced bat with a size of 6.6 cm (0′ 3″)