''Aeorestes'' is a genus or subgenus of

vesper bat Vespertilionidae is a family of microbats, of the order Chiroptera, flying, insect-eating mammals variously described as the common, vesper, or simple nosed bats. The vespertilionid family is the most diverse and widely distributed of bat famili ...

commonly known as the hoary bats. As a genus, it includes species that were formerly included in the genus ''

Lasiurus ''Lasiurus'' is a genus of bats in the family Vespertilionidae Vespertilionidae is a family of microbats, of the order Chiroptera, flying, insect-eating mammals variously described as the common, vesper, or simple nosed bats. The vespertilio ...

''.

Taxonomy

The genus was initially described by Austrian zoologist Leopold Fitzinger in 1870. Based on genetic divergence within ''

'', Baird et al. recommended that the hoary bats be recognized as a separate genus. They additionally recommended that ''

Dasypterus ''Dasypterus'' is a genus of or subgenus of vesper bat. As a genus, it includes species that were formerly in the genus ''Lasiurus''. Collectively, members of ''Dasypterus'' are referred to as the yellow bats. Taxonomy Based on genetic diver ...

'' should be elevated from a subgenus to a genus as well. However, as ''Lasiurus'' was previously monophyletic, some authors see the creation of two new genera—''Aeorestes'' and ''Dasypterus''—as a solution to something that was not a problem. Teta advocated using ''Aeorestes'' as a subgenus and retaining the usage of ''Dasypterus'' as such. In a 2017 follow-up to their 2015 study, Baird et al. again expressed that ''Aeorestes'', ''Dasypterus'', and ''Lasiurus'' should be separate genera comprising the

tribe The term tribe is used in many different contexts to refer to a category of human social group. The predominant worldwide usage of the term in English is in the discipline of anthropology. This definition is contested, in part due to confli ...

Lasiurini. They stated that the genetic distance of the three genera was much greater than observed between other bat genera, on average. In contrast to the average of 12.0% inter-generic divergence reported from another study on bats, ''Aeorestes'' and ''Dasypterus'' varied 18.79%; ''Aeorestes'' and ''Lasiurus'' varied 19.05%; and ''Dasypterus'' and ''Lasiurus'' varied 19.79%. ''Aeorestes'' split from ''Lasiurus'' approximately 17.99 Ma (million years ago). ''A. villosissimus'' diverged from the hoary bat and the Hawaiian hoary bat approximately 4.61 Ma, while the latter two species split from each other 1.35 Ma.

Species

Based on Baird et al., ''Aeorestes'' contains the following species: *

Hoary bat The hoary bat (''Lasiurus cinereus'') is a species of bat in the vesper bat family, Vespertilionidae. It lives throughout most of North America (possibly including Hawaii, although this is disputed). Taxonomy The hoary bat was described as a ...

(''A. cinereus'') *

Big red bat The big red bat (''Aeorestes egregius'') is a species of vesper bat from South and Central America. Taxonomy It was described as a new species in 1870 by German naturalist Wilhelm Peters. Peters placed it in the now-defunct genus ''Atalpha'', ...

(''A. egregius'') *

Hawaiian hoary bat The Hawaiian hoary bat (''Lasiurus semotus''), also known as ''ōpeapea'', is a species of bat endemic to the islands of Hawaii. Whereas the mainland hoary bat (''L. cinereus'') is found throughout North America, the Hawaiian hoary bat is distrib ...

(''A. semotus'') * South American hoary bat (''A. villosissimus'')

References

{{Taxonbar, from=Q39081027 Bat genera Taxa named by Leopold Fitzinger Vesper bats