Science is Fun Fridays!

 

This is a wrinkle-faced bat, one of many found in a cluster of trees in Costa Rica.

It is called lek behavior, the gathering of two or more males in a communal area to perform courtship displays.  Video and audio can be played Here which shows that they rub their wing tips together while emitting ultrasonic echolocation calls.  They also caught mating on film.

I purposely used the above image as the intro because - are you ready for this?

They're not cute.  But as you can see, the adult males have some extra skin that they use as a face mask.  What the team learned in Costa Rica is that they lower the mask when mating.  The population appears to be nomadic, as they did not return to the same area the following year.

Not only is this a rare bat species, but lek courtship itself is also rare - it is only known to be used by 12 mammal species.  

The study of bats is called Chiropterology.