Strange Creatures Called "Flying Foxes"
Best-Selling Non-Fiction on Live Pterosaurs
A number of species of Flying Fox fruit bats live in some of the tropics
Eyewitness Accounts of Living "Pterodactyls" or Pterosaurs in New Guinea
Copyright 2010, 2011 Jonathan Whitcomb
Although these Flying Fox fruit bats, here living in captivity, do not have any tree branch for roosting, they still have a prime location for a long day's sleep upside down.
For many years, reports of “pterodactyls” in Papua New Guinea were dismissed as misidentifications of Flying Fox fruit bats. Recent
investigations on Umboi Island, however, bring to light an astonishing possibility: The creature called “ropen” does not hang upside
down from a branch but holds itself upright on tree trunks. In addition, the ropen does not eat fruit but fish that it catches on
reefs by using a bioluminescent glow as it flies at night, over the water. If that was not enough to contradict the fruit bat, theropen has a long tail, almost half as long as its wingspan. Some reports indicate that there is something at the end of the tail that
may correspond to the Rhamphorhynchoid tail flange. A living pterosaur? That would be astonishing.
The nonfiction book "Live Pterosaurs in America" is the best-selling cryptozoology book on living pterosaurs (Amazon): amazing
accounts by eyewitnesses in the U.S.!
These are NOT bats at all.
In some areas of Papua New Guinea, islanders consider this bat to be a delicacy: an ingredient of soup. But how do they catch Flying
Foxes (called “black bocus” by those who speak the pidgin English language of Tok Pisin)? Native men and boys often climb trees to
get coconuts, but a colony of fruit bats would never stay put during such a slow attack. One way natives catch Flying Foxes is with
a slingshot. When a man with a slingshot is under a thick crowd of bats, the bat-density makes it more likely that one bat will be
shot and become soup.
Flying Fox of the Southwest Pacific
Giant Fruit Bats
Visitors to Australia, Papua New Guinea, or other islands of the Southwest Pacific are sometimes shocked at the giant bat called “Flying
Fox.” There’s no need to fear, however, for these are fruit bats, not vampire bats. Furry dog-faced mammals fly around the jungles
at night, searching for fruit.
Flying Foxes sleep hanging upside down during daylight hours, sometimes on branches crowded with
dozens of cousins and neighbors, chattering at each other.
In some areas of Northern Australia, fruit bats can be menacing, eats
tons of fruit from orchards. Still, many Australians love these bats, despite their threat to the owners of fruit trees.
Flying Creatures of the Night
Photo by gsbrown99
Photo by Kahunapule