Animalia > Chordata > Mammalia > Carnivora > Canidae > Otocyon > Otocyon megalotis

Otocyon megalotis (Bat-eared Fox; big-eared fox)

Synonyms: Canis megalotis

Wikipedia Abstract

The bat-eared fox (Otocyon megalotis) is a species of fox found on the African savanna, named for its large ears, which are used for thermoregulation. Fossil records show this canid first appeared during the middle Pleistocene, about 800,000 years ago. It is considered a basal canid species, resembling ancestral forms of the family.
View Wikipedia Record: Otocyon megalotis

Infraspecies

Otocyon megalotis canescens (Bat-eared fox)
Otocyon megalotis megalotis (Bat-eared fox)

EDGE Analysis

Uniqueness Scale: Similiar (0) 
4
 Unique (100)
Uniqueness & Vulnerability Scale: Similiar & Secure (0) 
23
 Unique & Vulnerable (100)
ED Score: 8.35
EDGE Score: 2.24
Learn more at EDGE of Existence programme

Attributes

Adult Weight [1]  9.149 lbs (4.15 kg)
Birth Weight [1]  122 grams
Diet [2]  Carnivore (Invertebrates), Carnivore (Vertebrates), Herbivore
Diet - Endothermic [2]  20 %
Diet - Invertibrates [2]  50 %
Diet - Plants [2]  20 %
Diet - Vertibrates [2]  10 %
Forages - Ground [2]  100 %
Female Maturity [1]  1 year
Gestation [1]  68 days
Litter Size [1]  4
Litters / Year [1]  2
Maximum Longevity [1]  17 years
Nocturnal [3]  Yes
Snout to Vent Length [4]  24 inches (60 cm)
Weaning [1]  3 months 15 days

Ecoregions

Protected Areas

Biodiversity Hotspots

Name Location Endemic Species Website
Cape Floristic Region South Africa No
Eastern Afromontane Burundi, Democratic Republic of Congo, Ethiopia, Eritrea, Kenya, Malawi, Mozambique, Rwanda, Saudi Arabia, Tanzania, Uganda, Yemen, Zimbabwe No
Horn of Africa Djibouti, Ethiopia, Eritrea, Kenya, Oman, Somalia, Yemen No
Maputaland-Pondoland-Albany Mozambique, South Africa, Swaziland No
Succulent Karoo Namibia, South Africa No

Prey / Diet

Prey / Diet Overlap

Predators

Consumers

Range Map

External References

Citations

Attributes / relations provided by
♦ 1de Magalhaes, J. P., and Costa, J. (2009) A database of vertebrate longevity records and their relation to other life-history traits. Journal of Evolutionary Biology 22(8):1770-1774
♦ 2Hamish Wilman, Jonathan Belmaker, Jennifer Simpson, Carolina de la Rosa, Marcelo M. Rivadeneira, and Walter Jetz. 2014. EltonTraits 1.0: Species-level foraging attributes of the world's birds and mammals. Ecology 95:2027
♦ 3Myers, P., R. Espinosa, C. S. Parr, T. Jones, G. S. Hammond, and T. A. Dewey. 2006. The Animal Diversity Web (online). Accessed February 01, 2010 at animaldiversity.org
♦ 4Nathan P. Myhrvold, Elita Baldridge, Benjamin Chan, Dhileep Sivam, Daniel L. Freeman, and S. K. Morgan Ernest. 2015. An amniote life-history database to perform comparative analyses with birds, mammals, and reptiles. Ecology 96:3109
♦ 5The Serengeti food web: empirical quantification and analysis of topological changes under increasing human impact, Sara N. de Visser, Bernd P. Freymann and Han Olff, Journal of Animal Ecology 2011, 80, 484–494
♦ 6Diet of bat-eared foxes Otocyon megalotis in the Karoo, Kuntzsch, V. and J.A.J. Nel. 1992, Koedoe 35(2): 37-48
♦ 76.6 Bat-eared fox, Otocyon megalotis, J.A.J. Nel and B. Maas, Sillero-Zubiri, C., Hoffmann, M. and Macdonald, D.W. (eds). 2004. Canids: Foxes, Wolves, Jackals and Dogs. Status Survey and Conservation Action Plan. IUCN/SSC Canid Specialist Group. Gland, Switzerland and Cambridge, UK. x + 430 pp.
♦ 8Gibson, D. I., Bray, R. A., & Harris, E. A. (Compilers) (2005). Host-Parasite Database of the Natural History Museum, London
♦ 9International Flea Database
Ecoregions provided by World Wide Fund For Nature (WWF). WildFinder: Online database of species distributions, ver. 01.06 Wildfinder Database
Biodiversity Hotspots provided by Critical Ecosystem Partnership Fund
Abstract provided by DBpedia licensed under a Creative Commons License
Species taxanomy provided by GBIF Secretariat (2022). GBIF Backbone Taxonomy. Checklist dataset https://doi.org/10.15468/39omei accessed via GBIF.org on 2023-06-13; License: CC BY 4.0