On the distribution of the Egyptian Fruit Bat Rousettus aegyptiacus in Saudi Arabia (Mammalia: Chiroptera)

Abstract

New records of the Egyptian Fruit Bat (Rousettus aegyptiacus) from 14 sites situated in the north-western part of Saudi Arabia interconnect the previously known parts of the distributon range of this bat in Arabia and suggest its continuous occurrence in a belt of coastal regions and the Hijaz Mountains along the Red Sea. These data indicate that the fruit bats can occur in very small spots of fertile environment surrounded by arid rocks and deserts and use them as foraging and roosting habitats. The occurrence of R. aegyptiacus was also confirmed in most of the sites where it was suggested previously. The occurrence in Hail represents the most remote spot of the fruit bat presence in the Arabian Desert, situated more than 500 km from the closest seashore, and around 315 km from the closest locality of R. aegyptiacus reported previously. We consider this occurrence an overlooked but traditional part of R. aegyptiacus distribution, connected with the broad use of the Date Palms grown in the area continuously since antiquity.

Keywords:

• Arabian Peninsula
• Middle East
• occurrence pattern

Supplementary Material

Supplementary Material is given as a Supplementary Annex, which is available via the “Supplementary” tab on the article’s online page.

Acknowledgements

We thank Mohamed Zakaria Hatim (Wageningen University, the Netherlands) for the help with identification of the Damas Tree, the food source of the Egyptian Fruit Bat in Saudi Arabia.

Disclosure Statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

Additional information

Funding

This study was supported by the Ministry of Culture of the Czech Republic (# DKRVO 2019– 2023/6.IX.e, 00023252).