White-winged Vampire Bat
We captured this beautiful, calm bat in our mist nets during Dec 2022 in the Parque Provincial Urugua-i. This is the second Vampire bat, after Desmodus rotundus, in Argentina and is qute rare. The colour is an almost unicolour caramel and the distinguishing features are that it has 2 pads on its thumb instead of 3 in the Common Vampire Bat. It also has white wing-tips and edges, which are very evident when the wing is spread.
The bat weighed 42g with a forearm length of 52.7mm.
This species tends to prey on birds rather than large mammals and takes a very small amount of blood from, for example, a chicken, with the use of their anti-coagulant saliva.
Rabies is rare in this species. The conservation status is unknown. They roost in caves and tree hollows
