Bizarre Walking Bat Has Ancient Heritage
Wednesday, July 29, 2009 - 09:14
in Paleontology & Archaeology
A bizarre New Zealand bat that is as much at home walking four-legged on the ground as winging through the air had an Australian ancestor 20 million years ago with the same rare ability, a new study has found. The discovery overturns a long-held held view that the agile walking and climbing skills of the lesser short-tailed bat evolved in the absence of any ground-dwelling mammal competitors or predators.
