Jon Russ - Bat Calls of Britain and Europe: A Guide to Species Identification

Bat Calls of Britain and Europe

Bat Calls of Britain and Europe

A GUIDE TO SPECIES IDENTIFICATION

Edited by Jon Russ

PELAGIC PUBLISHING

Published by Pelagic Publishing
PO Box 874
Exeter
EX3 9BR
UK

www.pelagicpublishing.com

Bat Calls of Britain and Europe: A Guide to Species Identification

ISBN 978-1-78427-225-8 Hardback
ISBN 978-1-78427-226-5 ePub
ISBN 978-1-78427-227-2 PDF

Copyright 2021 Jon Russ and Francisco Amorim, Leonardo Ancillotto, Maggie Andrews, Peter Andrews, Kate Barlow, Yves Bas, Arjan Boonman, Martijn Boonman, Philip Briggs, Erika Dahlberg, Johan Eklf, Pter Estk, Gaetano Fichera, Jeremy Froidevaux, Joanna Furmankiewicz, Panagiotis Georgiakakis, Clara Gonzalez Hernandez, Julia Hafner, Daniela Hamidovi, Amelia Hodnett, Pedro Horta, Artemis Kafkaletou-Diez, Andreas Kiefer, Erik Korsten, Alex Lefevre, Mauro Mucedda, Stephanie Murphy, Jorge M. Palmeirim, Eleni Papadatou, Ricardo Prez-Rodrguez, Ermanno Pidinchedda, Ana Rainho, Helena Raposeira, Orly Razgour, Hugo Rebelo, Dina Rnjak, Charlotte Roemer, Danilo Russo, Jens Rydell, Horst Schauer-Weisshahn, Grace Smarsh, Claude Steck, Srgio Teixeira, Marc Van De Sijpe, Carola van den Tempel.

The moral rights of the authors have been asserted.

All rights reserved. Apart from short excerpts for use in research or for reviews, no part of this document may be printed or reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, now known or hereafter invented or otherwise without prior permission from the publisher.

A CIP record for this book is available from the British Library

Front cover: Daubentons bat Myotis daubentonii Jens Rydell
Rear cover: Brown long-eared bat Plecotus auritus Ren Janssen

Typeset by BBR Design, Sheffield

Contents

About the Editor

Jon Russ first became interested in bats in 1994 while completing research on pipistrelle social calls as part of a degree in zoology at the University of Aberdeen. This led to a PhD at Queens University Belfast investigating the community composition, habitat associations and echolocation calls of Northern Irelands bats. Since then he has been involved in a wide variety of bat-related projects which have taken him from the freezing rain of northeast Scotland and the fine soft nights of Ireland to the humid rainforests of Madagascar, Thailand and Myanmar. Jon is the Director of Ridgeway Ecology Ltd, a specialist bat consultancy, and for several years he worked for the Bat Conservation Trust coordinating the iBats project in the UK and eastern Europe. He has written a large number of articles in scientific journals, and his other publications include the widely used book British Bat Calls: A Guide to Species Identification published by Pelagic Publishing. After more than 25 years of involvement in bat research and conservation, he continues to be fascinated by these remarkable mammals.

Following the surprising success of British Bat Calls, published in 2012, Nigel Massen of Pelagic Publishing kindly waited a few years before tentatively suggesting I collate a European version of the book. My immediate reaction was very positive it would be a simple matter to crowbar in the other species and I could probably have the whole thing wrapped up in six months. However, it soon became clear that I was being a little bit naive, and that incorporating 22 additional species (plus four that were added to the European list during the writing of this book) was well outside the scope of my experience and available time. After shelving the idea for around a year it occurred to me that it would be better to identify people who record and come into contact with those species for which I have limited or no knowledge and ask them to write the chapters instead. Taking up the role of editor as well as author, I began the task of finding volunteers, researchers and enthusiasts from around Europe who were willing to give up their time to assist with the project. It did not take as long as anticipated, and thanks to the excellent network of bat workers throughout Europe, I soon had a list of contributors and from then on the book began to take shape. Although at times it felt as if I was manoeuvring a large oil tanker into a small harbour, I think it has been well worth the effort by all involved. I hope it will be useful to volunteers and professionals alike.

This book would not have been possible without the efforts of all the authors who have given their valuable time and expertise. I have been overwhelmed by the generosity of my co-authors and cannot thank them enough. They are listed in the separate chapters and species sections, but all of them deserve a mention here. I am extremely grateful to Arjan Boonman for were written by Francisco Amorim, Leonardo Ancillotto, Maggie Andrews, Peter Andrews, Arjan Boonman, Erika Dahlberg, Johan Eklf, Pter Estk, Gaetano Fichera, Joanna Furmankiewicz, Panagiotis Georgiakakis, Clara Gonzalez Hernandez, Julia Hafner, Daniela Hamidovi, Amelia Hodnett, Pedro Horta, Artemis Kafkaletou-Diez, Andreas Kiefer, Erik Korsten, Alex Lefevre, Mauro Mucedda, Stephanie Murphy, Jorge M. Palmeirim, Eleni Papadatou, Ricardo Prez-Rodrguez, Ermanno Pidinchedda, Ana Rainho, Helena Raposeira, Orly Razgour, Hugo Rebelo, Dina Rnjak, Danilo Russo, Jens Rydell, Horst Schauer-Weisshahn, Claude Steck, Srgio Teixeira, Marc Van De Sijpe, Carola van den Tempel and myself.

I would like to thank (again) Marc Van De Sijpe and Alex Lefevre. Not only have they contributed to more than their fair share of the species chapters, as well as helping to write the basic echolocation identification guide, they have also unhesitatingly and generously provided me with hundreds of echolocation and social calls, which have vastly improved the book. They were always available to help when I was struggling with a particular species, and if they didnt have calls themselves they would find someone who did. Their knowledge of European bat species has been a rich seam to mine, and the book would have been much poorer without their input.

Arjan Boonman assisted enormously from the very beginning with his great technical knowledge and he put me in touch with Grace Smarsh, who vastly improved the acoustic communication chapter from my section on this topic in the British Bat Calls book.

Many people were kind enough to provide echolocation and social calls: Daniel Fernndez Alonso, Francisco Amorin, Leonardo Ancillotto, Maggie Andrews, Paulo Barros, Yves Bas, Yannick Beucher, Kirsten Bohn, Arjan Boonman, Erika Dahlberg, Jonathan Demaret, Christian Diez, Simon Dutilleul, Bengt Edqvist, Pter Estk, Rich Flight, Joanna Furmankiewicz, Panagiotis Georgiakakis, Julia Hafner, Daniela Hamidovi, Amelia Hodnett, Sally-Ann Hurry, Iain Hysom, David King, Erik Korsten, Karl Kugelschafter, Karri Kuitunen, David Lee, Alex Lefevre, Harry Lehto, Risto Lindstedt, Jochen Lueg, Kari Miettinen, Mauro Mucedda, Stephanie Murphy, Ian Nixon, Eleni Papadatou, Plecotus (Estudos Ambientais, Unip), Sbastien Puechmaille, Ana Rainho, Helena Raposeira, Phil Riddett, Ricardo Prez-Rodrguez, Danilo Russo, Jens Rydell, Horst Schauer-Weisshahn, Tricia Scott, Grace Smarsh, Graeme Smart, Michael Smotherman, Claude Steck, Congnan Sun, Srgio Teixeira, Marc Van De Sijpe, Carola van den Tempel, Anton Vlaschenko, Liat Wicks, Tina Wiffen and Bernadette Wimmer.

Several people provided photographs: Leonardo Ancillotto, Martyn Cooke, Klaus Echle, Pter Estk, Panagiotis Georgiakakis, Ren Janssen, Jos Jesus, Boris Krstini, Harry J. Lehto, Mauro Mucedda, Dragan Fixa Peli, Ana Rainho, Angel Ruiz Elizalde, Jens Rydell, James Shipman, Srgio Teixeira and Daniel Whitby. Ren Janssen deserves a special mention for the considerable number of stunning bat images he generously donated to this project, including the superb photograph of a brown long-eared bat