Colorful or “painted” woolly bats (Kerivoula picta) like the one pictured here are popular with collectors because of their fiery, fluffy appearance. The wild bats are sold online as colorful decorative objects – for $59 in a black mini coffin, for example, or for $140 with their wings spread in a picture frame. These macabre decorative pieces are not yet banned, but hunting the bats is nowhere near as harmless and sustainable as the sellers suggest.
The nocturnal mammals are about the size of a human finger and live for around ten years. Their skin is naturally fiery orange on the body and fingers and black on the wings and is covered with woolly fur. Unlike their more inconspicuous relatives, colorful woolly bats do not live in groups in caves, but as loners or pairs in fields and forests, where they nest in leaves and hunt insects. They are widespread in Southeast Asia from India to southern China and the Moluccas.
However, due to the sale of the stuffed dead animals on Etsy, eBay and Amazon, the number of wild colorful woolly bats is declining, researchers recently found. During the 2022 Halloween and Christmas season alone, 284 of the bats were sold in the United States. “In addition, there are all the others that are sold year-round on websites and in physical stores around the world,” says co-author Joanna Coleman of the City University of New York.
Kerivoula picta is currently classified as a “nearly threatened species” on the IUCN Red List of Threatened Species. However, biologists fear that the flourishing global decoration trade could lead to further declines in population. In addition, these bats reproduce and multiply very slowly. A decline in populations could therefore have long-term consequences.
“Their protection is incredibly important, not least because of the vital ecosystem services that bats provide,” says co-author Nistara Randhawa of the University of California in Davis. “With this study, we hope to raise awareness and advance the conservation of this species.” Specifically, the authors are calling for the international trade in the colorful woolly bats to be banned by law and for their protection to be enshrined in law.