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Find out some fun facts about bats with Steve and Aneeshwar. You can learn how they see in the dark, why they sleep upside down and what they eat!

Night time for us means resting from the busy day, but for most bats, this is when they're most active. This is known as being nocturnal. There's roughly 1,400 bat species living around the world, most of them are nocturnal, but not all of them.Ìý

Being nocturnal means that they spend the day sleeping or resting, literally hanging around in dark places such as caves, trees, or rock crevices.Ìý

When bats are hanging upside down they feel safer, as they can drop and fly away quickly if a predator comes. Bats use their feet to grasp onto the ceiling of a cave or wrap around branches of a tree to hang from.Ìý

Bats use their very special mouthes and noses to make an echolocation sound. Echolocation works by the bats making sounds which bounce off an object and then it bounces back into their ears, which makes a 3D map for them, so they "see with sound".

Yes, echolocations allows bats to locate and catch their food, even on the darkest of nights.

Different species of bats feed on different foods, but all bats in the UK eat insects! Bats which eat insects are known as insectivores, and they play an important role in our healthy ecosystems! In other countries, there are some bats that like to eat fruit, seeds, and pollen from flowers.

Bats like to stay together in big groups, especially during hibernation in the winter season to share body heat.

Bats hang out in groups called colonies.

At first glance, you might mistake a bat for a bird without feathers, but they are actually in two very different classes. Birds are aves and bats are mammals.ÌýBats are the only true flying mammals in the world.

Discover more about lots of different animals with these animal quizzes and fact files.Ìý

Find animal games, jigsaw puzzles, songs and more on the Animal Topic page.Ìý

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