5 8 THE MAMMALS OF THE WOODS 



BarbasteUe Like the long-eared species, the barbastelle (Barhastrlht harbas- 



etc - tettus) is the only representative of its genus met with in Europe, 



where its range extends from England and Scandinavia across central and 

 northern Europe to the temperate parts of Asia north of the Himalaya: it also 

 occurs in north Africa. The genus Pipistrellus, on the other hand, includes three 

 European species, the most familiar being the little pipistrelle (P. pygmceus), which 

 is the common British bat. This is a mouse-coloured species; but the great 

 noctule, first recognised as British by White of Selborne, is a large chestnut- 

 coloured species, which flies at a great altitude ; its title being P. noctula. A 

 third British species is the hairy -armed bat (P. leisleri), taking its name from the 

 presence of hair on the under side of the main bone of the wing. The mouse- 



■ 



XATTERER S BAT. 



coloured bat (VespertiLio murinus), on the other hand, is unknown in the 

 British Isles, and is representative of another genus. It ranges from France and 

 Italy to Siberia. Seldom found in treeless plains, in mountain regions and wooded 

 localities it is rarely absent. In Siberia it appears generally to leave the plains in 

 spring, betaking itself to higher ground, which is probably its habitat in other 

 districts. To the same genus belongs the serotine (V. serotinus), which is more 

 widely distributed than anj- other bat, being the only one common to both the 

 Western and Eastern Hemispheres. 



With Bechstein's bat (Myotis becksteini), a species of extreme rarity in Britain, 

 we come to yet another genus of the Vespertilionidas, of which four species occur 

 m England. Bechstein's bat on the Continent is generally found in hollow 

 trees, which are dry inside and provided with a narrow ascending entrance. Such 

 shelter this bat leaves only at a late hour in the evening, when it flies low and 

 rather slowly and awkwardly. As it flies, its long ears distinguish it easily from 



