18 
further participation in this veiK)rt as can the "vermin" ( the *i>ed-biigs," of a 
report in the liesident'y office at SandaJcan ! ). 
There are some rats in the cave and a small carnivore (*'miisang") is at least 
a casual visitor but these also ean be disregarded and arc never likely to become a 
serious menace. 
All the bats collected were small Microchiroptem (insect-eaters) but fruit- 
eating species are quite likely to occur. In the lower cave there is as mentioned 
above a large dark, subsidiary cave which seems entirely occupied by bats but they 
can also be seen clinging to the walls near the nests. It seems that in the 
Gomantong caves there is room for both birds and bats and there is still plenty of 
unoccupied space. In some of the smaller caves of the Kinabatangan the bats are 
said to dislodge nests by attempting to cling to them and it has been suggested 
that this is one of the reasons why the production of the small caves is not regular. 
This is the only "crime" that has been registered against the bats, a fortunate 
circumstance because it would be difficult, if not impossible, to deal with them by 
any method that would not injm^e the swiftlets. 
As a matter (If interest it may be mentioned that during the com'se of these 
investigations we were privileged to watch the fauaous nightly exodus of bats from 
the top of the cave. 
Tvvn (jhsci vcrs estimated that three thousand bats per minute left the cave 
and that the stream continued for half an hour. 
The serious enemies of the swiftlets are large birds of prey, especially the 
Brahmioy Kite numbers of which are always to be seen near the caves: the kites 
increase in number when the young birds are fledged. Bats are-aisp taken by 
these pests and perhaps form the greater part of their food butitie sw-iftlets also 
suffer and young and old alike are carried off. We actually saw this hap^ien and 
also found two newly-killed adult birds that had been struck down by hawks and 
not carried off. Possibly they managed to free themselves and died later. 
Indiscriminate or casual shooting by a native is not likely to thin the numbers 
uf the kites appreciably and a former experiment was not successful. As can be 
imagined most of the anjminiition su])plied was used for shooting mousedeer. A 
skilled persevering gunner could do a useful amount of damage in a week or two 
but it certainly seems wrong to shoot regularly near the mouth of the cave. It 
woujd be a dangerous precedent to introduce steel trap into the country ; such 
instruments are furthermore barbarous things. 
The ideal way of doing the maximum amount of damage in the minimum 
time is to find the nesting colony and destroy the eggs and [jarents. The nests 
arc placed in tall trees and a colony ahumt certainly exists near Gomantong or 
somewhere between Gomantong ami the coast. The kites are not migratory birds 
in the truest sen^e and the Gomantong thieves have quite likely been bred and 
