Overview

• Greater mouse-tailed bats avoid mid-air collisions by emitting shorter, weaker calls at higher frequencies, prioritizing the detection of nearby bats.
• Researchers found that 94% of echolocations are jammed during cave emergence, yet bats adapt within five seconds to significantly reduce interference.
• The bats maintain group structure while fanning out from the colony core, enhancing their ability to navigate crowded conditions.
• The study combined field data from tagged bats with a computational model to simulate dense emergence scenarios and fill data gaps.
• The findings, published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, underscore the importance of studying animals in their natural habitats to understand complex behaviors.