Structure of a Neotropical savanna bat community

During the 5-month dry season, I studied the community structure of bats in the Neotropical savanna of Espfritu, Bolivia. This seasonally inundated, grassland-dominated savanna is inhabited by greater than or equal to38 species of bats, and diversity is high (H' = 2.88). Species richness is highest in forest islands (26 species), open woodlands and gallery forests (11 species each), and dense thorny bushes (7 species) and less in other plant associations. Although species from almost all trophic guilds tilled by New World bats occur in the area, small medium-size low-flying insectivorous species and medium-to-large fruit-eating bats predominate.