News Paleontology

Flying Deaf? Earliest bats probably didn’t echolocate

By Sid Perkins

- More than 2 years ago

Fossils of a cardinal-sized creature recently unearthed in western Wyoming suggest that primitive bats developed the ability to fly before they could track their prey with biological sonar.

FREQUENT FLYER. Although many aspects of the fossils of Onychonycteris finneyi suggest that the ancient bat could fly, the size and structure of its inner ear indicate that the creature couldn’t echolocate.