Bats (Mammalia: Chiroptera) of the Eastern Mediterranean and MiddleEast. Part 6. Bats of Sinai (Egypt) with some taxonomic, ecological andecholocation data on that fauna

摘要

A complete list of bat records from Sinai was compiled, composed mostly of new findings from the field(85%). From the territory of Sinaitic peninsula, 106-111 records of up to 15 bat species are reported; viz. Rousettusaegyptiacus (Geoffroy, 1810) (10 records), Rhinopoma cystops Thomas, 1903 (1), Taphozous perforatus Geoffroy,1818 (1), Nycteris thebaica Geoffroy, 1813 (2), Rhinolophus clivosus Cretzschmar, 1830 (9), R. hipposideros(Borkhausen, 1797) (8), R. mehelyi Matschie, 1901 (1 [uncertain]), Asellia tridens (Geoffroy, 1813) (4-5), Eptesicusbottae (Peters, 1869) (6), Hypsugo oriel (Thomas, 1904) (24), Pipistrellus kuhlii (Kuhl, 1817) (3-5), Otonycterishemprichii Peters, 1859 (5), Barbastella leucomelas (Cretzschmar, 1830) (6), Plecotus christii Gray, 1838 (19-20),and Tadarida teniotis (Rafinesque, 1814) (8). Six species (R. aegyptiacus, R. cystops, T. perforatus, R. mehelyi,E. bottae, and T. teniotis) are here reported from Sinai for the first time. The taxonomic status of Rousettusaegyptiacus and Tadarida teniotis from Sinai is discussed. According to a profound taxonomic revision, Hypsugobodenheimeri (Harrison, 1960) has been found to be a junior synonym of Hypsugo oriel (Thomas, 1904). Thespecies status of Barbastella leucomelas from Sinai and southern Israel has been confirmed and hence, a separatespecies position for Central Asian Barbastella populations suggested. Representatives of Plecotus christii fromthe Sinaitic and southern Holy Land populations have been found to be significantly larger than the nominotypicalones from Upper Egypt and therefore described as a separate subspecies, P. christii petraeus subsp. nov. Basicdescriptive echolocation parameters for 12 Sinaitic bat species are given and discussed. Echolocation calls ofRhinolophus clivosus, Hypsugo oriel, Otonycteris hemprichii, Barbastella leucomelas, and Plecotus christii aredescribed in detail for the first time. Diet composition of six bat species (Rhinolophus clivosus, Hypsugo oriel,Otonycteris hemprichii, Barbastella leucomelas, Plecotus christii, and Tadarida teniotis) from Sinai was studiedand their feeding ecology discussed.