Guwahati: Meghalaya has marked a significant biodiversity breakthrough with the first-ever Indian record of Titania’s woolly bat (Kerivoula titania), following a scientific discovery in the Khasi Hills.
The finding, documented from the forested landscapes of Meghalaya, has been published in the peer-reviewed journal Animal Taxonomy and Ecology by a research team comprising Uttam Saikia, Manuel Ruedi, Rohit Chakravarty, Jennifer Lyngdoh, Rajib Goswami, and Gábor Csorba.
The rare bat was recorded during a December 2024 field survey in a community-owned forest near Thankharang village in East Khasi Hills, at an elevation of about 870 metres above sea level. Until now, Titania’s woolly bat was known only from parts of Southeast Asia, including Myanmar, Thailand, Laos, Cambodia, Vietnam, and China’s Yunnan province.
Researchers say the Meghalaya record represents a westward extension of the species’ known range by nearly 500 kilometres. With this discovery, the total number of bat species documented in India has risen to 137.
Because woolly bats are small, elusive, and adept at evading conventional mist nets, the team used specialised harp traps and acoustic lures to capture the specimen. The species’ identity was confirmed through an integrative taxonomic approach that combined detailed morphological examinations, bacular bone analysis, mitochondrial DNA sequencing, echolocation call analysis, and wing morphology measurements.
The study highlights that Titania’s woolly bat is a forest-interior specialist, adapted for slow, highly manoeuvrable flight within dense vegetation. Its wing structure and high-frequency echolocation calls point to a strong dependence on undisturbed tropical rainforest habitats, making the species particularly vulnerable to habitat loss and degradation.
According to the researchers, the discovery underscores how poorly explored Northeast India remains for small mammal diversity, despite a steady stream of new species descriptions and country records from the region in recent years. They stress the importance of intensified field surveys across Meghalaya and the wider Northeast, especially in community-managed forests, to better document and conserve the region’s hidden wildlife wealth.
“In recent times, there have been significant additions to the bat fauna of India in the form of descriptions of new species or new country records. Considering the perilous state of biodiversity in the country, it is imperative to thoroughly document the nation’s biological wealth to inform conservation strategies,” the researchers noted, calling for renewed momentum in field studies focused on lesser-known mammals.