Eudiscopus denticulus

Context: Meghalaya records India’s first bat with sticky disks.

Background: A team of scientists from the Zoological Survey of India (ZSI) and a few European natural history museums stumbled upon this “very specialised” small bat with “disk-like pads in the thumb and bright orange colouration” while sampling in a bamboo patch almost a year ago.

• Eudiscopus denticulus was recorded from the Lailad area near the Nongkhyllem Wildlife Sanctuary, about 1,000 km west of its nearest known habitat in Myanmar.
• Meghalaya has yielded India’s first bamboo-dwelling bat with sticky disks, taking the species count of the flying mammal in the country to 130.
• The newly-recorded bat was presumed to be a bamboo-dwelling species, but its flattened skull and adhesive pads helped in identifying it as the disk-footed known from specific localities in southern China, Vietnam, Thailand and Myanmar.
• Scientists analysed the very high frequency echolocation calls of the disk-footed bat, which was suitable for orientation in a cluttered environment such as inside bamboo groves.
• The disk-footed bat has raised Meghalaya’s bat count to 66, the most for any State in India.

https://www.thehindu.com/news/national/other-states/meghalaya-records-indias-first-bat-with-sticky-disks/article34349748.ece?homepage=true