Pallas's long-tongued bat

Pallas's long-tongued bat (Glossophaga soricina) is a small nectar-feeding New World leaf-nosed bat of the family Phyllostomidae, found from northern Mexico to Paraguay and northern Argentina and on Jamaica and the Bahamas. It weighs about 9 to 10 grams and shows several adaptations to nectar feeding, including a long extendable tongue for probing flowers, hair scales that hold pollen grains and a digestive system specialised for nectar and pollen. Besides pollen and nectar it eats flower parts, fruit and insects, and it is known to use parts of at least 34 plant species. Some animals defend small feeding territories around favoured plants, while others follow a regular trap-line route of 150 to 250 metres between flowers, and foraging is concentrated in the first four hours after sunset. Colonies of up to 1,000 individuals have been reported, and captive animals have lived about ten years. The species is probably important as a pollinator and as a disperser of seeds, there are no indications that it is threatened, and the IUCN lists it as Least Concern.