With dazzling images of the world’s most colorful bat in the bag, the quest was on to find and photograph the world’s smallest mammal: the Bumblee Bat (Craseonycteris thonglongya) aka Kitti’s hog-nosed bat.
The plush Batmobile took us from the northeast about 500 miles (800 km) west to Kanchanaburi, near the border with Myanmar (Burma). Destination: Sai Yok National Park. We’d explore limestone caves along the River Kwai, the habitat of the Bumblebee Bat.
Halfway through our road trip, we stopped at the temple Wat Chant Raram where Daniel suggested we take a look at a roost of Lyle’s Flying Foxes (Pteropus lylei). In spite of the midday sun, Merlin got a pretty nice shot. Within the sanctuary of the temple grounds, the bats knew they were safe.
I’ve included a link, Lyles flying fox camp, to a cleverly created video by our trip sponsor and fearless leader, Daniel Hargreaves, from a trip he took here last year. Daniel captured some courtship behavior. Stay till the end, when the bats fly off into the full moon, with the soothing chants of the monks in the background. Nicely done, Daniel!!! Lyles flying fox camp.