If you or I or any other human had a lower lip full of warts that would be considered a medical problem. We'd almost certainly want to get rid of it.
The Jamaican Fruit Bat, by contrast, has them as a matter of course. Many leaf nosed bats do. It's sometimes said to be a defense against toxins in the skins of amphibians they eat. Possibly, but the Jamaican is mostly frugivorous, so wouldn't really encounter that problem. But still, these are an adaptation to something, with origins coming from within the body. So they're not really warts, which are caused by viruses.
Must be said that the Jamaican Fruit Bat is also quite fetching, especially the babies.
2 comments:
Warts or no warts there's something very charming about bats - I agree the Jamaicans bat babies are very cute.
My favorites in the bat world are the much bigger varieties generally known as flying foxes and the particular ones are the giant golden-crowned flying foxes. Giant, you wonder? Yes, compared to other groups it weighs up to 3+ pounds and as a wingspan of +5 feet. Seeing a flock of those come out of the forest would be quite a surprise.
Unfortunately, there's not much chance of that since they share much of their territory with people. The other dismal thing is that as well as being sources of bushmeat they're also subject to some particularly nast communicable diseases.
Still, with it's golden head and huge eyes it makes for a very pretty creature.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Giant_golden-crowned_flying_fox
Bats are quite charming. No one wants to find out they're living in your house, but that's basically true of all animals that aren't pets. Which gets me to wonder if anyone has tried keeping them as pets.
Oh yes, giant golden crowned bats do look pretty grand. I imagine seeing a flock of them would catch your attention. It's weird to think that even they weigh only about as much as a quart of milk. Bats don't have hollow bones like birds but their bones are very lightweight. It's a big adjustment in evolutionary terms, which partially explains why more mammals haven't made it.
Markets selling bat meat were of course blamed for the start of COVID, which was almost certainly not true. Nevertheless bats as bushmeat are a bad idea. Aside from diseases, it plays havoc with their populations and can cause other sicknesses. And as with shark fin soup, there's really not a lot of meat there.
Nice picture on Wikipedia. They do look kind of canine.
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