New research suggests Mexican free-tailed bats have the ability to jam the sonar of their competitors and gobble up the prey first.
Bats typically use echolocation to track their prey in almost complete darkness, Wake Forest University reported. A new study shows when a bat hears another one going in for a kill it employs a specialized jamming mechanism that prevents its competitor from catching its target. These bats often take turns jamming each other's sonar until one gives up.
"This is the first study to show that bats actively jam the echolocation of other bats, and it increases the number of known functions of bat sounds to three: echolocation, communication, and acoustic interference," said Aaron Corcoran of the University of Maryland.
To make their findings the researchers ruled out other functions of the jamming call. The team recorded natural bat competitions with ultra-sensitive cameras and ultrasonic microphones that allowed them to map out the bats' flight paths from their emitted sounds alone. The team determined bats almost always missed their prey if they were being jammed.
In a second experiment the team lured in wild bats in order to have them capture moths that were attached to fishing line while different bat noises were broadcasted from a loudspeaker. They found the jamming call was the only sounds that caused the bats to miss their prey when it was played at the right time and frequency.
This type of jamming technique has only been observed in Mexican free-tailed bats, researchers are not sure if other bat species or even animals, such as dolphins, exhibit the same behavior.
"This research changes our understanding of the possible ways animals compete with each other for food, which is one of the most basic biological needs," Corcoran concluded.
The findings were published Nov. 6 in the journal Science.
