The lesser woolly horseshoe bat (''Rhinolophus beddomei''), also called Beddome's horseshoe bat, is a species of

bat Bats are mammals of the order Chiroptera.''cheir'', "hand" and πτερόν''pteron'', "wing". With their forelimbs adapted as wings, they are the only mammals capable of true and sustained flight. Bats are more agile in flight than most bi ...

in the family Rhinolophidae. It is found in

India India, officially the Republic of India (Hindi: ), is a country in South Asia. It is the seventh-largest country by area, the second-most populous country, and the most populous democracy in the world. Bounded by the Indian Ocean on the so ...

and

Sri Lanka Sri Lanka (, ; si, ශ්‍රී ලංකා, Śrī Laṅkā, translit-std=ISO (); ta, இலங்கை, Ilaṅkai, translit-std=ISO ()), formerly known as Ceylon and officially the Democratic Socialist Republic of Sri Lanka, is an ...

. Its natural habitats are subtropical or tropical moist lowland forests, caves, and urban areas.

Taxonomy and etymology

It was described as a new species in 1905 by Danish mammalogist Knud Andersen. The

eponym An eponym is a person, a place, or a thing after whom or which someone or something is, or is believed to be, named. The adjectives which are derived from the word eponym include ''eponymous'' and ''eponymic''. Usage of the word The term ''epon ...

for the

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 ...

"''beddomei''" is Colonel

Richard Henry Beddome Colonel Richard Henry Beddome (11 May 1830 – 23 February 1911) was a British military officer and naturalist in India, who became chief conservator of the Madras Forest Department. In the mid-19th century, he extensively surveyed several ...

, a British officer and naturalist who spent a good deal of his career in India. Beddome was the collector of 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 ...

for this species. The holotype was collected in the

Wayanad district Wayanad () is a district in the north-east of Indian state Kerala with administrative headquarters at the municipality of Kalpetta. It is the only plateau in Kerala. The Wayanad Plateau forms a continuation of the Mysore Plateau, the southern ...

of India. As '' Rhinolophus'' is quite speciose, it is divided into closely related "species groups." Andersen placed the lesser woolly horseshoe bat in the '' philippensis'' species group, but Simmons includes it in the ''trifoliatus'' species group. Some authors have considered it a subspecies of the woolly horseshoe bat; since 1992, it has usually been accorded full species status.

Description

The bat's head and body length is , with a forearm long and a wingspan of . Females are larger than males. Pelage is rough-textured and woolly. Body completely dark grayish brown, upper side grizzled. Wing membrane blackish brown. The ears are prominent, well-fluted, and pointy and nose-leaf is complex with a distinctive shape.

Biology and ecology

It is

nocturnal Nocturnality is an animal behavior characterized by being active during the night and sleeping during the day. The common adjective is "nocturnal", versus diurnal meaning the opposite. Nocturnal creatures generally have highly developed sens ...

, using echolocation to navigate in the dark. It echolocates at frequencies of 31.0–38.3k Hz; its frequencies of maximum energy are 38.5 and 38.7 kHz. Its call duration is 48.2–58.0 seconds.

References

{{Taxonbar, from=Q1762547 Rhinolophidae Mammals of India Mammals of Sri Lanka Mammals described in 1905 Bats of South Asia Taxa named by Knud Andersen Taxonomy articles created by Polbot