The appearance of the endangered Formosan flying fox (Pteropus dasymallus formosus) in Hualien’s Cultural Creative Industries Park on Wednesday last week was a “treat” and surprise, the park said, adding that it hoped the guest would remain on park grounds.
The park — on the campus of a former brewery — is home to 26 historical buildings on 3.3 hectares of land with many trees that are at least a century old, officials said.
Park deputy manager Fu Ting-wei (傅廷暐) said security guards discovered the bat while patrolling beyond a banyan tree near the parking lot.
Photo provided by Hualien Cultural Creative Industries Park
The guards heard the leaves rustling and spotted a “large animal,” Fu said, adding that the two initially thought it was a black-crowned night heron.
Park employee Wu Feng-hsu (吳豐旭) met the same guard under the banyan at noon on Monday and the two could see the visitor was a Formosan flying fox — native to Taiwan, Japan and Philippines, and listed by the Council of Agriculture as a first-class endangered species.
With a wingspan of up to 1m and a length of 20cm from head to toe, it is the largest bat in Taiwan.
Wu said the bat turned out to be “an old friend,” as it visited the park in September of 2013.
Wu said that with the park’s large variety of fruit trees, including Madagascan almonds and mangoes, the bat might be visiting for the abundance of food, as it is a strict herbivore.
The area is evidently beneficial to animals, as the park also attracted the nation’s smallest protected owl, the collared owlet (Glaucidium brodiei pardalotum), which rested in the same tree as the fruit bat.
Park employees were unwilling to give specific directions to the bat, saying that tourists might inadvertently scare it away.
Fu asked that tourists view the animal from a distance in hopes of keeping it on park grounds for a longer period of time.
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