Weber's myotis (''Myotis weberi'') 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

Indonesian Indonesian is anything of, from, or related to Indonesia, an archipelagic country in Southeast Asia. It may refer to: * Indonesians, citizens of Indonesia ** Native Indonesians, diverse groups of local inhabitants of the archipelago ** Indonesian ...

island of

Sulawesi Sulawesi (), also known as Celebes (), is an island in Indonesia. One of the four Greater Sunda Islands, and the world's eleventh-largest island, it is situated east of Borneo, west of the Maluku Islands, and south of Mindanao and the Sulu Ar ...

Taxonomy

It was described in 1890 as a distinct species by

Fredericus Anna Jentink Fredericus Anna Jentink (20 August 1844, Wymbritseradeel – 4 November 1913, Leiden)Fredericus Anna Jentink (1844 - 1913). In: Notes from the Leyden Museum Vol. 36, 1913. p 254 was a Dutch zoologist. Biography In 1875, he became curator at the R ...

, but later reclassified as conspecific with or as a subspecies of

Hodgson's bat Hodgson's bat (''Myotis formosus''), also called the copper-winged bat or black-and-orange myotis, is a species of vesper bat in the genus ''Myotis'', the mouse-eared bats. Favouring mountain forests, it is found throughout Central, Southeast, an ...

(''M. formosus''). However, a 2014 morphological study found major divergence between ''M. formosus'' and ''M. weberi'', and thus split them from one another. This has also been followed by the

American Society of Mammalogists The American Society of Mammalogists (ASM) was founded in 1919. Its primary purpose is to encourage the study of mammals, and professions studying them. There are over 4,500 members of this society, and they are primarily professional scientists ...

, the

IUCN Red List The International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) Red List of Threatened Species, also known as the IUCN Red List or Red Data Book, founded in 1964, is the world's most comprehensive inventory of the global conservation status of biol ...

, and the

ITIS The Integrated Taxonomic Information System (ITIS) is an American partnership of federal agencies designed to provide consistent and reliable information on the taxonomy of biological species. ITIS was originally formed in 1996 as an interagenc ...

. It was named after

Max Carl Wilhelm Weber Max Carl Wilhelm Weber van Bosse or Max Wilhelm Carl Weber (5 December 1852, in Bonn – 7 February 1937, in Eerbeek) was a German-Dutch zoologist and biogeographer. Weber studied at the University of Bonn, then at the Humboldt University in Be ...

Distribution and habitat

It is endemic to

Indonesia Indonesia, officially the Republic of Indonesia, is a country in Southeast Asia and Oceania between the Indian and Pacific oceans. It consists of over 17,000 islands, including Sumatra, Java, Sulawesi, and parts of Borneo and New Guine ...

, where it is only found on the island of

. It inhabits primary and secondary

tropical forest Tropical forests (a.k.a. jungle) are forested landscapes in tropical regions: ''i.e.'' land areas approximately bounded by the tropic of Cancer and Capricorn, but possibly affected by other factors such as prevailing winds. Some tropical fores ...

, likely with some resilience to human habitat degradation.

Status

This species is only known from four museum specimens, and thus extremely little is known about it. It may be threatened by logging of lowland forest, which it is likely closely associated with. However, very little is known about this species, and is thus classified as

Data Deficient A data deficient (DD) species is one which has been categorized by the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) as offering insufficient information for a proper assessment of conservation status to be made. This does not necessaril ...

by the

References

{{taxonbar, from=Q18419374 Mouse-eared bats Mammals of Sulawesi Endemic fauna of Indonesia Bats of Asia Mammals described in 1890 Taxa named by Fredericus Anna Jentink