Notes on the diet of frugivorous bats in lowland forest, Loreto-Peru

Dietary studies of bats have a tremendous significance pertaining to the dynamics of ecosystems in the Peruvian Amazon. This motivates investigations into the plant species consumed by frugivorous bats in lowland forest on the Itaya River, Loreto. For this study we installed 216 mist nets in 36 sample units from June to December 2009, with a total of 1296 labor hours per mist net. During this study, we identified 20 species of plants consumed by 195 individuals belonging to 15 distinct species of bats. The food items consumed belonged to trees, shrubs and grasses. The most common species consumed belong to the following botanical families: Moraceae, Araceae, Cyclanthaceae and Urticaceae. According to the Disperser Importance Index (DII), the two most prominent disperser species of bat are Rhinophylla pumilio y Artibeus obcurus. This study also revealed 13 species of plants previously unknown to be consumed by bats in Peru and the neotropics. This further proves how integral these mammals are as dispersal agents that complete a fundamental role in the repopulation of plants species, and the potential they have to recover Amazonian ecosystems subject to deterioration.