Cuban flower bat

The Cuban flower bat (Phyllonycteris poeyi), also called Poey's flower bat, is a medium-sized bat of the leaf-nosed family Phyllostomidae that is endemic to the Caribbean. It occurs on Cuba, Isla de la Juventud and surrounding smaller islands, and on Hispaniola in both Haiti and the Dominican Republic, where it inhabits evergreen forest and scrubland at elevations up to about 1,700 metres. It has a wingspan of 29 to 35 centimetres and weighs 15 to 29 grams, the males being significantly larger than the females, with silky, uniformly greyish-white fur, a short tail and a simple, rudimentary nose-leaf. A long tongue with a brush-like tip helps it feed on nectar. Nocturnal and gregarious, it spends the day in colonies of several thousand in narrow, blind-ending cave galleries and feeds mainly on seeds and flower pollen, with some flying insects. Two subspecies are generally recognised, one in Cuba and the Isla de la Juventud and one on Hispaniola.