The Canary long-eared bat (''Plecotus teneriffae''), also known as the Canary big-eared bat or Tenerife long-eared bat, is a species 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 familie ...

endemic Endemism is the state of a species being found in a single defined geographic location, such as an island, state, nation, country or other defined zone; organisms that are indigenous to a place are not endemic to it if they are also found elsew ...

to the

Canary Islands The Canary Islands (; es, Canarias, ), also known informally as the Canaries, are a Spanish autonomous community and archipelago in the Atlantic Ocean, in Macaronesia. At their closest point to the African mainland, they are west of Morocc ...

. According to the

IUCN The International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN; officially International Union for Conservation of Nature and Natural Resources) is an international organization working in the field of nature conservation and sustainable use of natu ...

, it is vulnerable to the risk of extinction. The species is primarily found in woodland habitat at elevations between 100 and 2300 m. It feeds mainly on moths. Roosting sites include caves,

lava tube A lava tube, or pyroduct, is a natural conduit formed by flowing lava from a volcanic vent that moves beneath the hardened surface of a lava flow. If lava in the tube empties, it will leave a cave. Formation A lava tube is a type of lava ca ...

s and abandoned buildings.

Taxonomy and etymology

It was described as a new species in 1907 by British mammalogist

Gerald Edwin Hamilton Barrett-Hamilton Major Gerald Edwin Hamilton Barrett-Hamilton (1871 – 17 January 1914) was a British/Irish natural historian, co-author with M. A. C. Hinton of ''A History of British Mammals'', which remained "the most thorough, accurate and scientific public ...

. He described it based on specimens in the

British Museum of Natural History The Natural History Museum in London is a museum that exhibits a vast range of specimens from various segments of natural history. It is one of three major museums on Exhibition Road in South Kensington, the others being the Science Museum an ...

. The

holotype A holotype is a single physical example (or illustration) of an organism, known to have been used when the species (or lower-ranked taxon) was formally described. It is either the single such physical example (or illustration) or one of several ...

had been collected by R. Gomez in April 1887 near the town of

La Orotava La Orotava is a town and a municipality in the northern part of Tenerife, one of the Canary Islands of Spain. The area of the municipality stretches from the north coast to the mountainous interior, and includes the summit of the Teide volcano, ...

. "R. Gomez" was likely Ramon Gomez, a local pharmacist who traded in medicines, old coins, and biological specimens from the Canary Islands. Its

species name In taxonomy, binomial nomenclature ("two-term naming system"), also called nomenclature ("two-name naming system") or binary nomenclature, is a formal system of naming species of living things by giving each a name composed of two parts, bot ...

"''teneriffae''" is derived from

Tenerife Tenerife (; ; formerly spelled ''Teneriffe'') is the largest and most populous island of the Canary Islands. It is home to 43% of the total population of the archipelago. With a land area of and a population of 978,100 inhabitants as of Janu ...

, which is one of the islands of the

and the place where the holotype was collected.

Description

When Hamilton described it as a new species, he noted that it was similar in appearance to the

brown long-eared bat The brown long-eared bat or common long-eared bat (''Plecotus auritus'') is a small Eurasian insectivorous bat. It has distinctive ears, long and with a distinctive fold. It is extremely similar to the much rarer grey long-eared bat which was on ...

, ''Plecotus auritus'', but that it had "much larger wings."

Conservation

It is evaluated as vulnerable by the

. It meets the criteria for this designation because its estimated area of occurrence is less than , it is found in fewer than five locations, its population is declining, and it is losing habitat. It is threatened by

habitat loss Habitat destruction (also termed habitat loss and habitat reduction) is the process by which a natural habitat becomes incapable of supporting its native species. The organisms that previously inhabited the site are displaced or dead, thereby ...

due to

deforestation Deforestation or forest clearance is the removal of a forest or stand of trees from land that is then converted to non-forest use. Deforestation can involve conversion of forest land to farms, ranches, or urban use. The most concentrated d ...

, use of pesticides near forest habitat, and loss of roosting sites due to building renovation. The remaining population is estimated to number between 500 and 2000. Only two breeding colonies, one each on

La Palma La Palma (, ), also known as ''La isla bonita'' () and officially San Miguel de La Palma, is the most north-westerly island of the Canary Islands, Spain. La Palma has an area of making it the fifth largest of the eight main Canary Islands. The ...

(in the

Cuevas de los Murciélagos The Cuevas de los Murciélagos are a complex of two volcanic caves on La Palma, Canary Islands. They are located at the Nacientes de Marcos y Cordero (springs of Marcos and Cordero) near the municipality of San Andrés y Sauces in the north of the ...

)Domingo Trujillo
Plecotus teneriffae Orejudo canario
2004:p 258-261 and

, are known; the larger La Palma colony is estimated to have declined by 80% in recent years. It is a protected species under Spanish law and international conventions (the

Bonn Convention The Convention on the Conservation of Migratory Species of Wild Animals, also known as the Convention on Migratory Species (CMS) or the Bonn Convention, is an international agreement that aims to conserve migratory species throughout their r ...

and

Berne Convention The Berne Convention for the Protection of Literary and Artistic Works, usually known as the Berne Convention, was an international assembly held in 1886 in the Swiss city of Bern by ten European countries with the goal to agree on a set of leg ...

References

External links

Photographs of this species
{{Taxonbar, from=Q123100 Plecotus Bats of Africa Endemic fauna of the Canary Islands Mammals of the Canary Islands Endangered fauna of Africa Taxonomy articles created by Polbot Mammals described in 1907 Taxa named by Gerald Edwin Hamilton Barrett-Hamilton