66 VESPERTILIONID^— NYCTALUS 



hibernation. In like manner, its feeding grounds change with 

 the season, the choice of them and the presence or absence of 

 the bats being no doubt determined by the distribution of the 

 insects upon which they feed. At Dunham, in Cheshire, 

 write Messrs Coward and Oldham, " at first these bats fly very 

 high, squeaking and chasing one another around and above 

 the tree-tops. During summer they frequent the open glades, 

 generally flying high ; but towards the middle of September 

 they resort in great numbers to the water-meadows by the 

 river BoUin, flying up and down alongside the park-wall, often 

 not more than ten or twelve feet from the ground." 



The general conformation of this bat is essentially adapted 

 to the capture and mastication of beetles. Its broad muzzle 

 and strong jaws are quite equal to the reduction of the larger 

 kinds, such as the dor-beetle or the cockchafer, of which, 

 according to the elder J. H. Gurney,^ one has been known to 

 consume as many as thirty in half an hour. The stubborn elytra 

 are invariably cut off at the base and rejected, and these, where 

 the bats feed thickly over water, have astonished an observer, 

 ignorant of their habits, as they fell in showers on the surface.'' 

 In fact, so strong is this species that, as related below, it seems 

 likely that it has but seldom need to call in the assistance of 

 the interfemoral pouch, the mainstay of the smaller kinds. At 

 all events, although he has seen the pouch used in captivity, 

 thus showing that this species is not unacquainted with the 

 habit, Mr Oldham, who has spent hours watching wild 

 Noctules, has never once detected them in the act of pouching 

 an insect ; and Frank Norton,* although believing that the tail 

 "is certainly brought very much into play," never succeeded in 

 proving this, as in the case of the Whiskered Bat, which, he 

 states, is easily caught by the wing when a beetle is suspended 

 near its beat on a hook. On the other hand, Mr Whitaker 

 informs me that on one occasion he deceived one into pouch- 

 ing a pebble thrown up to attract it. The bat carried the 

 pebble a distance of some yards before dropping it with a splash 

 into some water. This propensity of bats to mistake pebbles 

 or other objects for their prey is well known ; and an object 



■ Zoologist, 1874, 4153. ^ Thomas Ford, Field, loth September 1898, 470. 

 ' Midland Naturalist, 1883, 151-152. 



