Madagascar sucker-footed bat

The Madagascar sucker-footed bat, Myzopoda aurita, is a small bat found only on the island of Madagascar, mostly in the forests of the eastern part. It is one of the two living species of the genus Myzopoda, the only genus of the family Myzopodidae. The genus was thought to hold a single species until the western sucker-footed bat was found in the central western lowlands. The bat is named for small cups on its wrists and ankles. It roosts inside the rolled leaves of the traveller's tree, and although the cups were long called suckers, the bat attaches itself by wet adhesion, using a body fluid secreted at the pads, and muscle contraction lets it separate the pads to climb and to release itself. For this reason it is one of the few bats that roosts head up rather than upside down. The smooth leaves of the traveller's tree are unsuitable for small arthropods, so these bats carry no ectoparasites. Most of those caught in eastern Madagascar were in or near stands of traveller's trees, and the longest distance they were found to travel while foraging was about 1.8 kilometres. They feed largely on beetles and small moths. The species was classified as Vulnerable in the 1996 IUCN Red List, but it is now known to be more abundant and was reclassified as Least Concern in 2008.