How Nectar-Feeding Bats Localize their Food: Echolocation Behavior of Leptonycteris yerbabuenae Approaching Cactus Flowers.

Nectar-feeding bats show morphological, physiological, and behavioral adaptations for feeding on nectar. How they find and localize flowers is still poorly understood. While scent cues alone allow no precise localization of a floral target, the spatial properties of flower echoes are very precise and could play a major role, particularly at close range.

Ecosystem services provided by bats.

Ecosystem services are the benefits obtained from the environment that increase human well-being. Economic valuation is conducted by measuring the human welfare gains or losses that result from changes in the provision of ecosystem services. Bats have long been postulated to play important roles in arthropod suppression, seed dispersal, and pollination; however, only recently have these ecosystem services begun to be thoroughly evaluated.

Exploring demographic, physical, and historical explanations for the genetic structure of two lineages of Greater Antillean bats.

Observed patterns of genetic structure result from the interactions of demographic, physical, and historical influences on gene flow. The particular strength of various factors in governing gene flow, however, may differ between species in biologically relevant ways. We investigated the role of demographic factors (population size and sex-biased dispersal) and physical features (geographic distance, island size and climatological winds) on patterns of genetic structure and gene flow for two lineages of Greater Antillean bats.

The evolution of bat pollination: a phylogenetic perspective.

Background: Most tropical and subtropical plants are biotically pollinated, and insects are the major pollinators. A small but ecologically and economically important group of plants classified in 28 orders, 67 families and about 528 species of angiosperms are pollinated by nectar-feeding bats. From a phylogenetic perspective this is a derived pollination mode involving a relatively large and energetically expensive pollinator.

Characterization of polymorphic microsatellite loci for two species of phyllostomid bats from the Greater Antilles (Erophylla sezekorni and Macrotus waterhousii).

We developed 12 polymorphic microsatellite loci for the buffy flower bat (Erophylla sezekorni) and 10 loci for Waterhouse's big-eared bat (Macrotus waterhousii). In E. sezekorni, we tested 65 individuals from three islands, Cuba, Exuma, and Abaco.

The role of frugivorous bats in tropical forest succession.

Discussion of successional change has traditionally focused on plants. The role of animals in producing and responding to successional change has received far less attention. Dispersal of plant propagules by animals is a fundamental part of successional change in the tropics.

Genetic population structure and mobility of two nectar-feeding bats from Venezuelan deserts: inferences from mitochondrial DNA.

Glossophaga longirostris and Leptonycteris curasoae are nectar-feeding bats associated with arid zones in northern South America. Despite their close phylogenetic relationship, sympatric condition and niche similarities, morphological and ecological evidence suggest that these species differ in dispersal capabilities. Using mitochondrial DNA, we tested the hypothesis that these species exhibit different levels of population structure that are congruent with their particular movement capabilities.

Population genetic structure of Venezuelan chiropterophilous columnar cacti (Cactaceae).

We conducted allozyme surveys of three Venezuelan self-incompatible chiropterophilous columnar cacti: two diploid species, Stenocereus griseus and Cereus repandus, and one tetraploid, Pilosocereus lanuginosus. The three cacti are pollinated by bats, and both bats and birds disperse seeds. Population sampling comprised two spatial scales: all Venezuelan arid zones (macrogeographic) and two arid regions in northwestern Venezuela (regional).

Historical vicariance and postglacial colonization effects on the evolution of genetic structure in Lophocereus, a Sonoran Desert columnar cactus.

Distinguishing the historical effects of gene migration and vicariance on contemporary genetic structure is problematic without testable biogeographic hypotheses based on preexisting geological and environmental evidence. The availability of such hypotheses for North America's Sonoran Desert has contributed to our understanding of the effect of historical vicariance and dispersal events on the diversification of this region's vertebrate biota but have not yet been applied to its flora. In this paper we describe a detailed allozyme analysis of the population genetic structure and phylogeography of the Sonoran Desert columnar cactus, Lophocereus schottii (senita).

Co-pollinators and specialization in the pollinating seed-consumer mutualism between senita cacti and senita moths.

Specialization of a plant on a particular pollinator may not evolve if co-pollinators are effective and abundant. This is particularly evident if fruit set is resource limited and cannot be increased above the levels produced by the actions of co-pollinators. The pollinating seed-consuming interaction between senita cacti and senita moths in the Sonoran Desert presents a paradox because it exhibits many traits resembling those of the highly specialized yucca/yucca moth system, but also involves co-pollinators.

Geographic and population variation in pollinating seed-consuming interactions between senita cacti (Lophocereus schottii) and senita moths (Upiga virescens).

Interspecific interactions can vary within and among populations and geographic locations. This variation can subsequently influence the evolution and coevolution of species interactions. We investigated population and geographic variation in traits important to pollinating seed-consuming interactions between the senita cactus (Lophocereus schottii) and its obligate pollinating moth (Upiga virescens), both of which are geographically restricted to the Sonoran Desert.

The evolution of obligate pollination mutualisms: senita cactus and senita moth.

We report a new obligate pollination mutualism involving the senita cactus, Lophocereus schottii (Cactaceae, Pachyceereae), and the senita moth, Upiga virescens (Pyralidae, Glaphyriinae) in the Sonoran Desert and discuss the evolution of specialized pollination mutualisms. L. schottii is a night-blooming, self-incompatible columnar cactus.

Seasonal changes in the diets of migrant and non-migrant nectarivorous bats as revealed by carbon stable isotope analysis.

Three species of nectar-feeding bats migrate from tropical and subtropical Mexico into the Sonoran and Chihuahuan deserts during the spring and summer months. We examined geographic and seasonal changes in the diet of one migrant species, Leptonycteris curasoae, using carbon stable isotope techniques to determine the relative importance of C3 and CAM (Cactaceae, Agavaceae) plants in its diet. We also examined the diet of a non-migratory nectar-feeding bat, Glossophaga soricina, from southern Mexico using the same techniques.

On the analysis of phenological overlap.

We briefly review current methods for detecting nonrandom patterns in the temporal overlap of flowering and fruiting curves. We discuss the assumptions behind these methods and propose a new method of analysis using computer simulations to measure n-wise, rather than pairwise, temporal overlap. We quantify the extent to which observed n-wise overlap differs from minimum possible n-wise overlap and apply our method to several data sets to test the hypothesis that interspecific competition for animal visitors has produced flowering curves whose overlap is less than that expected by chance.

Parallel trends in the species diversity of west indian birds and bats.

In this paper I compare several biogeographic patterns of West Indian resident land birds and bats, including species-area and trophic diversity-area relationships, the number of islands inhabited per species and levels of endemism, trophic structure as compared with tropical mainland areas, and the degree of faunal simlarity between islands of similar sizes but different locations. In most respects, the bat and bird patterns are strikingly similar. Groups of birds that are conspicuously missing from the Antilles because of the absence of appropriate resources also have missing chiropteran counterparts.

Fecundity, fruiting pattern, and seed dispersal in Piper amalago (Piperaceae), a bat-dispersed tropical shrub.

This paper describes the nightly and seasonal production of ripe fruit by Piper amalago (Piperaceae), a patchily distributed, bat-dispersed forest shrub, at Parque Nacional Santa Rosa, Costa Rica. Phenological observations over several years indicate that individuals produce a low (usually 1-3) and variable number of ripe fruit each night for 3-4 wks in the early wet season (June and July). Observations of the disappearance rates of marked fruits and fruit manipulation experiments indicate that fruit removal probabilities are high (often nearly 1.