Biology
Acoustic Adaptations for Echolocation in Bats Across Foraging Habitats
Quick fact
Bats that hunt in open spaces use low-frequency, long, narrowband calls to detect prey over long distances, while bats that hunt in cluttered forests use high-frequency, short, broadband calls to pinpoint prey among obstacles—a difference that can be over 100 kHz.
Why this is interesting
You probably know that bats 'see' with sound. But did you know that a bat's echolocation call is exquisitely tailored to the spaces it hunts in—so much so that calls of bats in open fields sound completely different from those in dense forests?