I. Drink. Your. Fruitshake.

November 11, 2012 7:23 PM

"On hot days or as a special treat her endangered grey-headed flying foxes are treated to a special mix of blended fruit juices. Camilla the 12-week-old bat especially enjoys hanging around and partaking of a cold 'frothy'."
posted by griphus (42 comments total)

HELLO MS. BAT HELLO
posted by The Whelk at 7:24 PM on November 11, 2012

I want one sooooo baaaaaaaaaddddddd

Ugh lookit her cute little fuzzy tummy we would be best friends I just know it
posted by These Birds of a Feather at 7:28 PM on November 11, 2012 [4 favorites]

perhaps it is for the best that the title on the article 'bat smoothies' is misleading.
posted by juv3nal at 7:37 PM on November 11, 2012 [4 favorites]

My dog is black and gray and tan and loves fruit juice and spends a lot of time upside down. I think he must be part flying fox (not the flying part).
posted by moonmilk at 7:43 PM on November 11, 2012 [4 favorites]

I WANT A LITTLE BAT FRIEND
posted by The Whelk at 7:44 PM on November 11, 2012 [4 favorites]

"...we would be best friends I just know it"

Only if you like to stay up late.
posted by Kevin Street at 7:45 PM on November 11, 2012

simmer down robin
posted by elizardbits at 7:46 PM on November 11, 2012 [3 favorites]

oh look an upside-down baby bear with wings.
posted by griphus at 7:46 PM on November 11, 2012 [2 favorites]

eyebrows!
posted by moonmilk at 7:52 PM on November 11, 2012 [1 favorite]

Kevin Street: "...we would be best friends I just know it"

Only if you like to stay up late.

I DO!!!! It was meant to be!
posted by IAmBroom at 7:59 PM on November 11, 2012 [1 favorite]

I think the only appropriate response in this situation is 'squee!'

(jeez she is so little and delicate and happy about having a smoothie and also mostly upside down)
posted by capricorn at 8:07 PM on November 11, 2012 [1 favorite]

Best thing I've seen today. Thank you for this post.
posted by bibliogrrl at 8:26 PM on November 11, 2012

man so embarrassing they printed all the photos of that fox upside-down
posted by shakespeherian at 8:26 PM on November 11, 2012

squeeee!
posted by _paegan_ at 8:29 PM on November 11, 2012

This summer, I was too lazy to fully seal my window air conditioner unit, and a couple times a bat got into my apartment. I was very excited about this, because bats are awesome and this one (I strongly suspect it was the same bat both times, although that is just a Comrade Bat fantasy) was especially adorable. However, not wanting to get rabies and whatever other horrible diseases our city bats carry, I had to ruefully box it up and take it outside. Life is so difficult sometimes.
posted by cthuljew at 8:34 PM on November 11, 2012

On November 27, 1984, on "Late Night," bat expert Dr. Merlin Tuttle brought out a similar giant bat. Dave's comment at the time: "What have you done to that chihuahua?!?!"*
posted by hippybear at 8:41 PM on November 11, 2012 [2 favorites]

perhaps it is for the best that the title on the article 'bat smoothies' is misleading.
posted by juv3nal

The Bat-o-matic
posted by 445supermag at 8:41 PM on November 11, 2012

I thought the pic of her with smoothie all over her beautiful little snout was the cutest thing, but then it just kept getting cuter, until that final, perfect image.

And the bonus bats being posted - eeeeee!
posted by batmonkey at 8:48 PM on November 11, 2012

perhaps it is for the best that the title on the article 'bat smoothies' is misleading.

Unfortunately, however, fruit bat soup is not something fed to bats when they have a cold.
posted by univac at 8:58 PM on November 11, 2012

This summer, I was too lazy to fully seal my window air conditioner unit, and a couple times a bat got into my apartment

Good lord, where do you live? Transylvania?
posted by ericost at 9:05 PM on November 11, 2012 [3 favorites]

i want a bat!
posted by UrbanClassic at 9:16 PM on November 11, 2012

i want a bat!

You won't end up with a housepet, but if you want bats in your area, you should look into putting up some bat houses. But be sure to look carefully at the design and placement of the bat house.

You'll be glad you did. They eat pest insects and will make your yard or neighborhood more livable as a result.
posted by hippybear at 9:21 PM on November 11, 2012 [4 favorites]

"I am the night!"
posted by moonmilk at 9:35 PM on November 11, 2012 [3 favorites]

I WANT HUG IT
posted by louche mustachio at 9:38 PM on November 11, 2012 [1 favorite]

Certain bats evolved alongside certain flowers and they put their snouts into these big blooming flowers and suck out whatever flowers make as a way to lure bats. So I guess that smoothy is like the worlds most awesome flower.
posted by stbalbach at 9:39 PM on November 11, 2012

My apartment hallway has a few windows whose screens are sometimes pulled open by accident in summer along with the sliding glass. More than once I have come home from work at dusk and walked down a cramped dark hallway (the lights are on a timer) only to be greeted by a black, bouncing silhouette, materializing suddenly out of the gloom, flying quickly towards me right at head level, looking so cartoonishly like a cheap battery powered Halloween gimmick that at first you don't realize it's a REAL LIIIVE BAAAAAAAT! GAAAAAH!

When I am sitting quietly at home and suddenly hear a shrill piercing shriek just outside my door, I know the girl living down the hall has just had the same encounter.

Herding the little critter out the exit by waving your arms in the air is an exercise in patience and nerves every time his sonar says NO to the stairwell and he elegantly executes an Immelmann turn right for your face.
posted by CynicalKnight at 9:43 PM on November 11, 2012 [3 favorites]

Na na na na na na na na na na na na na na na na Bat smoothies!

And just in case you haven't overdosed on bat cuteness yet: Baby rescue bat burritos!
posted by azpenguin at 10:07 PM on November 11, 2012

Average wingspan of one meter? Yeesh. "Megabat" is right.
posted by koeselitz at 11:31 PM on November 11, 2012

I will now have "my fruitshake brings all the bats to the yard" going through my head for a few days.
posted by Avelwood at 11:47 PM on November 11, 2012 [5 favorites]

My awesome in-laws work for WIRES and currently have about 4 or 5 flying fox pups. They're social creatures and need to have company - human will do just fine as a temporary measure - when they're grown up, they're sent away to bat camp to socialize with other bats and learn good bat manners. It's one of the few cases where human interaction is not kept to a minimum.

Last time I visited, I managed to turn up around one of the many feeding times. BIL was on the couch giving bottles to two very little pups (holding the swaddled baby upside down - it looked SO wrong) and SIL was wandering around in what appeared to be a loose blouse. Which spouted wings and long grasping fingers as soon as fruit was produced. She had 3 young flying foxes casually draped over her like it was no big deal and the noise they produced ran up past the human hearing threshold and into tooth-tingling territory. Let me tell you, a mouth full of mushy banana did NOTHING to dampen the noise.

The bottle fed pups are fed every couple of hours and get tiny dummies in the interim to keep them quiet and happy. SO CUTE!
posted by ninazer0 at 11:50 PM on November 11, 2012 [7 favorites]

BAT CAMP! Oh my...
posted by Trivia Newton John at 11:53 PM on November 11, 2012

Dragonbat has my smoothie.
posted by adipocere at 12:05 AM on November 12, 2012

Fun Fact: The high concentrations of fruit acids in fruit-bat diets means that their crap can rip the paint right off a car. It'll also discolour PVC (like the type used for kiddie pools YOU BAT BASTARDS, IT HAD DOLPHINS ON IT) and kill plants.

Other than that, bats are awesome.
posted by Jilder at 12:23 AM on November 12, 2012 [1 favorite]

"Fun Fact: The high concentrations of fruit acids in fruit-bat diets means that their crap can rip the paint right off a car. It'll also discolour PVC (like the type used for kiddie pools YOU BAT BASTARDS, IT HAD DOLPHINS ON IT) and kill plants."

True fact: the pH of fresh fruit bat guano is roughly neutral to slightly alkaline (while that of insectivorous bats is acidic) - it's the cyclic terpines like limonene (the basis of 'citrus' cleaners & many paint strippers) & similar compounds from the fruit, flowers, & gums they eat that damages paint & plastic.
posted by Pinback at 12:47 AM on November 12, 2012 [4 favorites]

As a person whose car is even now suffering from a variety of bat-related paint issues, HOLY MOTHER OF GOD SO CUTE THESE PICTURES, SO WEE AND ADORABLE!

But god dammit bats, stop crapping on my car.
posted by pseudonymph at 2:13 AM on November 12, 2012 [1 favorite]

Flying foxes ARE awesome. And a lot more charming and inquisitive than you'd expect. They're cute little things, albeit with those sharp little hooks on the end of their wings. Their back - between their wings - is ridiculously soft, a weird combination between their fur and the leathery texture of their wings.

I once dated someone whose parents had a pet flying fox; his sister used to rehab them as part of her job and one of them remained. It used to sleep during the day, it would have a daily shower in the bathroom, get dried off and dusted off with talc, and then it would go outside for exercise at dusk. That involved the parents hanging it off the clothesline in the backyard, walking back to the house, calling it, and having it fly towards them. They would repeat it until it got tired. Nothing is scarier than the sight of a fruit bat looking like it's about to wrap itself around your face!

They'd also let it crawl around the house, which was one of the most astonishing things ever: if it wasn't flying, it wasn't very graceful. It kind of loped along, trying to catch the hooks on its wings in something to drag itself. But it always had one goal: to get to a human, climb up its leg, and get a pat. The pro tip was to wear jeans when it was out and about; a giant hook in your calf was the quickest way to wreck a relaxing evening in front of the TV. Of course, this was easier said than done: jeans in the tropical humidity of far north Queensland = ew.

And once all the shenanigans were over, a big pile of overripe fruits would go in its cage and it would go mental over mangoes and cover itself with the sticky juice. No wonder it needed daily bathing.
posted by chronic sublime at 2:14 AM on November 12, 2012 [13 favorites]

(Also, that mango I sat outside on my back table yesterday to ripen? That was not intended as an offering for my Adorable Batty Overlords, kindly deliver a replacement at once.)
posted by pseudonymph at 2:14 AM on November 12, 2012 [1 favorite]

I posted this on another bat-related thread a few months ago, but it's always worth it: Behold the world's happiest fruit bat.
posted by Mr. Bad Example at 2:42 AM on November 12, 2012 [6 favorites]

Pinback: Always thought it was the fruit acids. I now know better. I now also know more about batshit than I had ever hoped.
posted by Jilder at 3:14 AM on November 12, 2012

Yeah, batshit's insane.
posted by MartinWisse at 4:15 AM on November 12, 2012 [11 favorites]

So I was in Mexico, and my family and I were walking back from dinner to go back to the cabin and go to bed. We walk by a sunken swimming pool, and I see a little frog thrashing about. Poor fellow, I think, as I flash back to rescuing frogs from the city pool back home before the chlorine and lack of food did them in. So I put my arm in, and the frog manages to catch on, and then it starts hooking its way up my arm.

What?!

It was a bat. A really sodden baby bat. I accidentally dropped it onto the ground a few times because the hooking made its movements erratic and it'd lose balance, but eventually I managed to bring it back to the cabin and we used a hairdryer on it. Sometime during the hairdrying, we realized it could be rabid and tried to limit contact, but luckily there were no bite attempts. Then we put it on a washcloth outside on an open patio table.

It seemed pretty meek and thrown, and I still wonder if it made it or if it disappeared that night into an iguana's belly instead of back to its shelter. It was definitely gone by the morning. I named it Stella.

I hope Stella did make it.
posted by vegartanipla at 9:54 PM on November 12, 2012 [2 favorites]

How To: Preserve a bat for museum display
posted by homunculus at 12:22 PM on November 14, 2012