drinking and flying does alcohol consumption affect the flight and echolocation performance of phyllostomid bats饮酒,饮酒会影响航班飞行和phyllostomid蝙蝠的回声定位性能.pdfVIP

Drinking and Flying: Does Alcohol Consumption Affect the Flight and Echolocation Performance of Phyllostomid Bats? 1 1 2 1 1 Dara N. Orbach , Nina Veselka , Yvonne Dzal , Louis Lazure , M. Brock Fenton * 1 Department of Biology, University of Western Ontario, London, Ontario, Canada, 2 Department of Biology, University of Regina, Regina, Saskatchewan, Canada Abstract Background: In the wild, frugivorous and nectarivorous bats often eat fermenting fruits and nectar, and thus may consume levels of ethanol that could induce inebriation. To understand if consumption of ethanol by bats alters their access to food and general survival requires examination of behavioural responses to its ingestion, as well as assessment of interspecific variation in those responses. We predicted that bats fed ethanol would show impaired flight and echolocation behaviour compared to bats fed control sugar water, and that there would be behavioural differences among species. Methodology/Principal Findings: We fed wild caught Artibeus jamaicensis, A. lituratus, A. phaeotis, Carollia sowelli, Glossophaga soricina, and Sturnira lilium (Chiroptera, Phyllostomidae) sugar water (44 g of table sugar in 500 ml of water) or sugar water with ethanol before challenging them to fly through an obstacle course while we simultaneously recorded their echolocation calls. We used bat saliva, a non-invasive proxy, to measure blood ethanol concentrations ranging from 0 to .0.3% immediately before flight trials. Flight performance and echolocation behaviour were not significantly affected by consumption of ethanol, but species differed in their blood alcohol concentrations after consuming it. Conclusions/Significance: The bats we studied display a tolerance for ethanol that could