Low foraging rates drive large insectivorous bats away from urban areas.

Urbanization has significant impacts on wildlife and ecosystems and acts as an environmental filter excluding certain species from local ecological communities. Specifically, it may be challenging for some animals to find enough food in urban environments to achieve a positive energy balance. Because urban environments favor small-sized bats with low energy requirements, we hypothesized that common noctules (Nyctalus noctula) acquire food at a slower rate and rely less on conspecifics to find prey in urban than in rural environments due to a low food abundance and predictable distribution of insects in urban environments.

Long-term field study reveals that warmer summers lead to larger and longer-lived females only in northern populations of Natterer's bats.

Animals often respond to climate change with changes in morphology, e.g., shrinking body size with increasing temperatures, as expected by Bergmann's rule.

Precipitation during two weeks in spring influences reproductive success of first-year females in the long-lived Natterer's bat.

Bats are characterized by low reproductive rates in contrast with most of other small mammals. This makes their populations vulnerable when inclement environmental conditions such as cold and rainy weather impair the reproductive success of females. The fine-scale effect of weather on bats, however, remains largely unknown.