LISTING THE FULL CONTENTS FOR FORTEAN STUDIES - THE ERSTWHILE SISTER SCHOLARLY JOURNAL OF FORTEAN TIMES

 

Front covers of Vols 1-4 of Fortean Studies (© Fortean Times/John Brown Publishing – reproduced here on a strictly non-commercial Fair Use basis for educational/review purposes only)

I recently received an enquiry from Facebook follower Mike Robe, asking if I knew of anywhere online that contained a complete list of contents for each of the seven published volumes of Fortean Studies – the scholarly journal published annually-ish from 1994 to 2001 inclusive by John Brown Publishing of London for the long-running monthly British magazine Fortean Times, which is famously devoted to all matters of a mysterious, inexplicable, and truly Fortean nature. After spending some time checking online, I was very surprised to discover that such listings were indeed conspicuous only by their apparent absence there.

Having been fortunate enough to contribute to virtually every Fortean Studies volume an article of my own (each of which I have subsequently expanded, updated, and included as a chapter in one of my books), I'm very familiar with this journal's contents and their outstanding scholarly merit, collectively constituting a very sizeable corpus of in-depth, extensively-researched  contributions too lengthy and specialized for publication in Fortean Times, thus explaining why Fortean Studies was established. It's a great pity that it ceased publication after just seven volumes, but at least many copies of each of these still exist, offering an authoritative, highly-informative, fascinating read for everyone interested in Fortean phenomena.

Consequently, as a response both to Mike's enquiry and to what I feel to be a necessity that the contents of Fortean Studies should, very deservedly, be brought to the widespread attention of online readers, I am presenting herewith a series of scans of the front cover and, on the back cover, the list of contents for each Fortean Studies volume from my own library.

NB – Please note that Vol. 1 does contain an article of mine, 'A Belfy of Crypto-Bats', positioned directly after Michel Raynal's giant octopus article, but for some unexplained reason it was omitted from the list of contents.

 

Fortean Studies, Volume 1, 1994 – click to expand for reading purposes (© Fortean Times/John Brown Publishing – reproduced here on a strictly non-commercial Fair Use basis for educational/review purposes only)

 

 

Fortean Studies, Volume 2, 1995 – click to expand for reading purposes (© Fortean Times/John Brown Publishing – reproduced here on a strictly non-commercial Fair Use basis for educational/review purposes only)

 

 

Fortean Studies, Volume 3, 1996 – click to expand for reading purposes (© Fortean Times/John Brown Publishing – reproduced here on a strictly non-commercial Fair Use basis for educational/review purposes only)

 

 

Fortean Studies, Volume 4, 1998 [for 1997] – click to expand for reading purposes (© Fortean Times/John Brown Publishing – reproduced here on a strictly non-commercial Fair Use basis for educational/review purposes only)

 

 

Fortean Studies, Volume 5, 1998 – click to expand for reading purposes (© Fortean Times/John Brown Publishing – reproduced here on a strictly non-commercial Fair Use basis for educational/review purposes only)

 

 

Fortean Studies, Volume 6, 1999 – click to expand for reading purposes (© Fortean Times/John Brown Publishing – reproduced here on a strictly non-commercial Fair Use basis for educational/review purposes only)

 

 

Fortean Studies, Volume 7, 2001 – click to expand for reading purposes (© Fortean Times/John Brown Publishing – reproduced here on a strictly non-commercial Fair Use basis for educational/review purposes only)

 

Exceptional pressures of work meant that I was unable to contribute an article to Vol. 6, whereas the article on winged cats that I was planning for Vol. 7 proved so arduous in terms of length and required research that I couldn't complete it in time to meet its publication deadline (it finally appeared almost a decade later, in my book Dr Shuker's Casebook). Nevertheless, I did still contribute to Vol. 7, inasmuch as I was nominated as a reviewer by its editors to evaluate Darren Naish's sea serpent article in manuscript form and offer my opinion as to whether it should be published in Fortean Studies. After reading it, I stated that it should be, so it was.

Second-hand copies of Fortean Studies still appear for sale quite frequently on online auction and bookstore sites, but such listings rarely provide full details of these publications' contents. So I hope that this present ShukerNature post will be of benefit to readers who are thinking of purchasing any Fortean Studies volumes but until now have been deterred from doing so by being uncertain of what they contain.

I wish to thank most sincerely my longstanding friend and fellow cryptozoology enthusiast Mike Playfair for very kindly gifting me his spare copy of Fortean Studies Vol. 7 after learning that this was the one volume that I hadn't been able to track down.

I also wish to pay tribute to the memory of the late Steve Moore, who edited all but that final, seventh volume, for encouraging me to contribute to Fortean Studies and also for being another longstanding friend of mine within the Fortean community.

 

Front covers of Vols 5-7 of Fortean Studies (© Fortean Times/John Brown Publishing – reproduced here on a strictly non-commercial Fair Use basis for educational/review purposes only)

 

THE ELEPHANT DUNG BAT - OR, A CRYPTIC CRYPTO-CHIROPTERAN FROM KENYA

 

Might Kenya's elusive elephant dung bat be an unidentified relative of Britain's familiar serotine bat Eptesicus serotinus, as exquisitely painted here by Archibald Thornburn? (public domain)

Bats are an intrinsic insignia of Halloween – so what better subject to write about today than a cryptic crypto-chiropteran, or, in plainer parlance, a hidden mystery bat?

Whereas cryptozoology's most famous mystery bats are distinguished by their huge size (viz. the Javanese ahool and African olitiau – click here to read all about them on ShukerNature), the example under consideration in this present blog article of mine is of notably diminutive dimensions. Indeed, this is the very characteristic that enables it to indulge in the bizarre day-roosting activity that has incited such scientific curiosity.

 

Two of my many ornithological field guides are authored by John G. Williams (© John G. Williams Estate/HarperCollins – reproduced here on a strictly non-commercial Fair Use basis for educational/review purposes only)

On 23 May 1990, Welsh-born ornithologist John G. Williams (1913-1997), a renowned expert on African avifauna, wrote me a detailed 3-page letter concerning this mystery bat, as reproduced in full by me further down here for the very first time anywhere, and which provided me with valuable background information. In 1955, Williams was taking part in the MacChesney Expedition to Kenya, from Cornell University's Laboratory of Ornithology, and in June of that year he encountered Terence Adamson, brother of the late George Adamson of Born Free fame. During a conversation concerning the wildlife inhabiting the little-explored forests of Mount Kulal, an extinct volcano just east of Lake Turkana in northern Kenya, Adamson casually mentioned a peculiar little bat that had attracted his particular interest – by virtue of its unique predilection for spending its days snugly concealed inside dry piles of elephant dung!

Bats are well known for selecting unusual hideaways during the daylight hours, requisitioning everything from birds' nests to aardvark burrows, even concealing themselves in the centre of rolled banana leaves. However, there was no species known to science that habitually secreted itself within the crevices present in deposits of elephant excrement. As a consequence, Adamson had been eager to discover all that he could regarding this extraordinary creature.

 

African avifauna expert John G. Williams (public domain)

He had first encountered one of its cryptic kind during a walk through Kenya's Marsabit Forest (of which he was warden). After idly kicking a pile of elephant dung lying on the path along which he was strolling, he saw a small grey creature fly out of it and alight upon a tree nearby. Expecting it to be nothing more notable than some form of large moth, Adamson was very startled to find that it was an exceedingly small bat, with silver brownish-grey fur, paler upon its underparts. He was especially surprised by its tiny size – its wingspan was even less than that of the familiar pipistrelles, which are among the smallest of bats. Unfortunately, he was only able to observe it for a few moments before it took to the air again and disappeared, but his interest was sufficiently stirred for him to make a determined effort thereafter to seek out other specimens of this odd little animal.

Moreover, Adamson also informed Williams that during his visit to Mount Kulal he had succeeded in spotting a second one – unceremoniously ejected from its diurnal seclusion when he had kicked over a pile of pachyderm droppings at the base of the Kulal foothills. Unlike the first specimen, however, this one had flown away without making any attempt to land close by, so Adamson had been unable to make any additional observations.

 

The full 3-page letter regarding the mystifying elephant dung bat that John G. Williams kindly wrote to me on 23 May 1990 following an enquiry of mine concerning this creature (please click each page to enlarge for reading purposes) (© Dr Karl Shuker/John G. Williams)

As Williams noted in a short article published within the June 1967 issue of the British wildlife magazine Animals (which as far as I am aware is the only account published regarding this coprophilic chiropteran prior to my own writings), and which is what prompted me 23 years later to contact him, he too became very keen to espy, and possibly even capture, one of these elusive denizens of the dung piles, in the hope of identifying their species. And so, to his travelling companions' great amusement, he made a special point thereafter of zealously felling as many dry mounds of elephant excrement as he could, in the the Katamayu Forest of the Kenya Highlands, and elsewhere too, on the off-chance that he might conjure forth one of these perplexing little bats.

Despite such valiant efforts, however, Williams never did succeed in flushing one forth. Moreover, to the best of my knowledge the elephant dung bat has still not been captured, and its identity remains unresolved. However, as he opined in his letter to me above, one species already known to science may provide the answer.

 

A mystery within a mystery – I have seen various postings of this photograph online with claims that it depicts a horn-skinned bat Eptesicus floweri and was snapped by a Hugh Clark; conversely, on Wikipedia this same photo's subject is claimed to be an Austrian Tyrol specimen of a closely-related Eurasian species E. nilssonii, the northern bat, and the photo itself is attributed to someone with the Wikipedia username Mnolf who has made it available for public usage under the CC BY-SA 3.0 sharing licence (Consequently, because which bat species this picture truly depicts and who the picture belongs to are presently unknown to me, I am reproducing it here on a strictly non-commercial Fair Use basis for educational/review purposes only.)

The species in question is a rare vespertilionid micro-bat called Eptesicus (Rhinopterus) floweri, formally described in 1901 by British zoologist William E. de Winton, and currently recorded only from Mali and Sudan (but possibly also Niger and Chad, directly sandwiched as they are between those two countries). It is commonly termed the horn-skinned bat, calling to attention the tiny horny excrescences that it bears upon the upper surface of its limbs and tail. This species resembles the elephant dung bat in general size and colour, but an important additional reason why Williams favoured its candidature as the latter creature's identity is its remarkable preference for day-roosting within holes in the ground, especially among the roots of acacia trees.

As he pointed out to me, this habitat is really quite similar to the crevices and cracks present within dry heaps of elephant dung, hence it is not difficult to believe that this species would utilise these useful sources of daytime roosting sites if such were available. And as the Mount Kulal region of northern Kenya is not only little-explored but also not too far beyond its known distribution range, this provides further reason for looking favourably upon the horn-skinned bat as a realistic answer to the mystery of the latter country's curious little elephant dung bat.

This ShukerNature blog article is excerpted and expanded from my book The Beasts That Hide From Man: Seeking The World's Last Undiscovered Animals.

THE BLOOD-DRINKING 'DEATH BIRDS' OF ETHIOPIA - ON SILENT, SINISTER WINGS THEY COME...

Assuming that they do exist, just what ARE the terrifying blood-drinking 'death birds' of Ethiopia (© Ben Male)

The little-known cryptozoological case of the Ethiopian 'death bird' is unremittingly macabre and horrific, more akin to the gothic outpourings of Poe and Le Fanu than to anything from the dispassionate, sober chronicles of zoology. Yet in spite of this, it is only too real; at the present time, moreover, it is also unsolved. I am most grateful to Queensland zoologist Malcolm Smith for bringing this chilling but hitherto unexamined case to my attention, and for kindly supplying me with a copy of the original source of information concerning it.

It was during an archaeological expedition to Ethiopia (then Abyssinia) during the early 1930s, before the country was invaded by Italian troops prior to World War II, that Hungarian/American amateur archaeologist and anthropologist 'Count' Byron Khun de Prorok (1896-1954) first learnt of Devil's Cave, whose grisly secret he subsequently documented in his travelogue Dead Men Do Tell Tales (1933).

Journeying through the province of Walaga, he resided for a time at the home of its governor, Dajjazmac Mariam, and while there he was approached by one of the servants, a young boy who began to tell him about a secret cave situated roughly an hour's horseback-ride away, near a place called Lekempti. It was known to the local people as Devil's Cave, and was widely held to be an abode of evil and horror - plagued by devil-men who prowled its darkened recesses in the guise of ferocious hyaenas, and by flocks of a greatly-feared form of bat referred to as the death bird.

No-one had ever dared to penetrate this mysterious cavern, but de Prorok decided to defy its forbidding reputation, because he thought it possible that there would be prehistoric rock paintings inside (especially as its notoriety would have served well in warding off potential trespassers, who might have desecrated any artwork preserved within its stygian gloom).

'Count' Byron Khun de Prorok (public domain)

When de Prorok told his young informant of his decision to visit Devil's Cave, the boy was terrified, but after being bribed with a plentiful supply of gifts he agreed very reluctantly to act as de Prorok's guide - though only on the strict understanding that he would not be held responsible for anything that happened!

The cave was situated high among rocky pinnacles and jungle foliage, but de Prorok succeeded in scrambling up to it, and in removing the several heavy boulders blocking its entrance. Armed with a gun, and leaving his guide trembling with fear outside, he cautiously stepped inside - and was almost bowled over a few minutes later by a panic-stricken pack of hyaenas hurtling down one of the passages to the newly-unsealed entrance. Seeking to defend himself against a possible attack by them, he shot one that approached a little too close for comfort, and the echoes from the blast reverberated far and wide, ultimately reaching the ears of two goatherds who came to the cave mouth to find out what was happening. Here they were met by de Prorok, who had followed the hyaenas at a respectful distance during their shambolic exit, and was greatly shocked by the men's pitiful state - they seemed little more than animated skeletons, upon which were hung a few tattered rags.

When, with the boy as interpreter, they learnt that de Prorok planned to go back inside the cave, they implored him to change his mind, warning him of the death birds. De Prorok, however, was not afraid of bats and made his way once more through the cave's sombre corridors, until he suddenly heard a loud whirring sound overhead. This proved to be a huge cloud of bats, which flew rapidly towards the cave mouth when he fired off a shot in alarm. These, he presumed, must be the dreaded death birds, a line of speculation speedily confirmed when only moments later a rain of bat excrement, dislodged by the shot, began to pelt down upon him from the cave roof, accompanied by an asphyxiating stench that drove him back almost at once to the entrance in search of breathable air.

Outside, he enquired why everyone was so afraid of these bats, to which the two goatherds and the boy all replied that they were blood-suckers - that night after night they came to drink the blood of anyone living near the cave until eventually their unfortunate victims died. This was why the only people living here now were the goatherds (who were forced to do so by the goats' owners), and was the reason for their emaciated state. The death birds' vampiresque activities ensured that none of the goatherds lived very long, but they were always replaced by others, thereby providing the goats with constant supervision - and the death birds with a constant supply of their ghoulish nutriment.

Dead Men Do Tell Tales (public domain)

To provide him with additional proof of their statements, the two goatherds took de Prorok to their camp nearby; all of the herders there were equally skeletal - and one was close to death. Little more than a pile of bones scarcely held together by a shroud of ashen skin, this living corpse of a man lay huddled in a cot, with blood-stained rags and clothes on either side, and was so weakened by the nightly depredations of the visiting death birds that he was unable to stand, capable only of extending a wraith-like arm. The goatherds told de Prorok that the death birds settled upon their bodies while they were asleep, so softly that they did not even wake; and that they were sizeable beasts, with wingspans of 12-18 in.

As for physical evidence of the death birds' sanguinivorous nature, the goatherds showed him their arms, which clearly bore a number of small wounds - the puncture marks left behind by these winged leeches once they had gorged themselves upon their hapless hosts?

Nothing more has emerged concerning this gruesome affair, but for zoologists it would have some significant repercussions if de Prorok's account could be shown to be accurate. Only three modern-day species of blood-drinking bat are currently known to science - and all three of these are confined exclusively to the Americas!

Common vampire bat Desmodus rotundus (© Uwe Schmidt/Wikipedia - CC BY-SA 4.0 licence)

These are the notorious vampire bats, of which the best-known is the common vampire Desmodus rotundus, whose range extends from northern Mexico to central Chile, northern Argentina, Uruguay, and Trinidad; its numbers have dramatically increased since the introduction of sheep and other livestock to these areas with the coming of the Europeans, serving to expand the diversity and numbers of potential prey victims for it. The other two species are the white-winged vampire Diaemus youngi, recorded from northeastern Mexico to eastern Peru, northern Argentina, Brazil, and Trinidad; and the hairy-legged vampire Diphylla ecaudata, ranging from southern Texas to eastern Peru and southern Brazil.

(As a thought-provoking digression, there may also be a fourth, giant vampire bat in existence. Within the Proceedings of the Biological Society of Washington for 7 December 1988, researchers Drs Gary S. Morgan, Omar J. Linares, and Clayton E. Ray formally described a new species of vampire, 25% larger in size than Desmodus rotundus, based upon two incomplete skulls and skeletal remains found in Venezuela's famous Cueva del Guácharo - home of the extraordinary sound-emitting oilbird Steatornis caripensis. Dubbed D. draculae, this giant vampire bat's remains date from the Pleistocene. However, Brazilian zoologists Drs E. Trajano and M. de Vivo, in a Mammalia paper from 1991, noted that there are reports of local inhabitants in southeastern Brazil's Ribeira Valley referring to attacks upon cattle and horses by large bats that could suggest the continuing survival here of D. draculae, although despite extensive recent searches of caves in this area none has been found...so far?)

Over the years, a great deal of misinformation has been dissipated concerning this nocturnal, terror-inducing trio of micro-bats - including the persistent fallacy that they actively suck blood out of wounds; and the equally tenacious, fanciful misconception that they are enormous beasts with gigantic wings into which they are only too eager to enfold their stricken victims while draining them of their precious scarlet fluid. In contrast, the truth is (as always) far less exotic and extravagant.

Any creature that can subsist entirely upon a diet of blood (sanginivory) must obviously be highly specialised, and the vampire bats are no exception; Canadian biologist Dr Brock Fenton from Young University in Ontario has suggested that they evolved from bats that originally consumed blood-sucking insects attracted to wounds on large animals, but which eventually acquired a taste for the animals' blood themselves. Yet in overall external appearance these nefarious species are disappointingly mundane - with an unimpressive total length of only 2-3.5 in, a very modest wingspan of 5-6 in, and a covering of unmemorably brown, short fur. Only when they open their mouth to reveal a distinctive pair of shear-like upper incisors do they display the first intimation of their sinister lifestyle.

Head and face of a common vampire bat, revealing its specialised dentition (© Uwe Schmidt/Wikipedia - CC BY-SA 4.0 licence)

These incisors terminate in a central point and have long, scalpel-sharp edges, perfectly adapted for surreptitiously shaving a thin sliver of skin from the body or neck of an unsuspecting (usually sleeping) victim - detected by the vampire's ultrasonic echo-location faculties. The wound that is produced is sufficiently deep to slice through the skin's capillaries, but not deep enough to disturb the victim and thereby waken it (or arouse its attention if already awake) - stealth is the byword of the vampire's lifestyle. Aiding the furtive creation of this finely-engineered wound are the bat's canine teeth, shorter than the incisors but just as sharp.

Once the wound begins to seep blood in a steady flow, the vampire, delicately clinging to the flank or back of its victim with its wings and hook-like thumbs (not with its sharp claws - yet another fallacy), avidly laps the escaping fluid with its grooved, muscular tongue. It can also suck it up by folding its tongue over a notch in its lower lip to yield a tube, but it only sucks blood that has already flowed out of the wound. In addition, its saliva contains anticoagulants, preventing the blood from clotting, and thereby providing the bat with an ample supply (but causing its victim to lose more than would have been the case if the wound had been inflicted by some other type of sharp cutting implement).

Indeed, one of these anticoagulants, plasminogen activator (Bat-PA for short), shows promise as a powerful drug in the prevention of the severe physiological damage caused by heart attacks in humans, according to a study of its effects by research fellow Dr Stephen Gardell at Merck Sharp & Dohme Research Laboratories in West Point, Pennsylvania.

The vampire's teeth, tongue, and thumbs are not the only specialised facets of its anatomy - its gut also exhibits some important modifications. Enabling the bat to gorge itself thoroughly before bidding its victim a silent adieu, its stomach has an enormous extra compartment - a tubular, blind-ending diverticulum unattached to the rest of the digestive tract and capable of prodigious distension, rendering it able to hold a voluminous quantity of blood. Sometimes the bat can scarcely fly after feeding, because it is so heavy with freshly ingested blood. Also, its oesophagus is specialised for efficient water absorption, a necessity for any obligate sanguinivore because blood contains an appreciable proportion of water.

Exclusively sanguinivorous bats, like this common vampire, are known to science only from the New World, not from the Old World as well (© Desmodus/Wikipedia - CC BY SA 3.0 licence)

What all of this means in relation to the Ethiopian death bird is that any bat thriving solely or even predominantly upon a diet of blood is inevitably a much-modified species, rigorously adapted for such a lifestyle - rather than a mere opportunist species that in certain localities has switched (through some unusual set of circumstances) from its normal diet to a sanguinivorous existence. In other words, if de Prorok's account is a truthful one, then surely the death bird must be a species new to science? After all, there is currently no known species of Old World bat that is a confirmed dedicated blood-drinker. This, then, is plainly one plausible answer to the death bird mystery - but it is not the only such answer.

I am exceedingly grateful to the late John Edwards Hill, bat specialist and formerly Principal Scientific Officer at London's Natural History Museum, who presented me with a great deal of information that offers a completely different outlook upon this perplexing case. It is well known that the New World vampire bats transmit livestock diseases from one animal victim to another, in a manner paralleling the activities of mosquitoes and other sanguinivorous insect vectors. They also carry rabies to humans, although this is a much rarer occurrence than the more lurid reports in the popular press would have us believe. Moreover, bats of many species all around the world are known to contract many different types of bacterial, viral, and protozoan diseases, which can be spread to other organisms via parasites such as body lice and ticks that live upon the bats' skin or fur. Relapsing fever in humans, for example, is caused by the bacterium Borrelia recurrentis, carried by lice and ticks that have in turn derived it from former rodent or bat hosts.

Accordingly, during communications concerning the death bird, Hill suggested to me that it is possible that humans venturing in or near a cave heavily infested with bats (like Devil's Cave, for instance) would become infected with such diseases - if lice or ticks, dropping from the bats as they flew overhead, bit the unfortunate humans upon which they landed. A parasite-borne infection of this nature would account for the bite-like wounds of the goatherds observed by de Prorok; and, depending upon the precise type of infection, could ultimately give rise to the emaciated condition exhibited by these afflicted persons.

Additionally, native superstition and a deep-rooted fear of bats might be sufficient, when coupled with the distressing effects of a parasite-borne infection, to nurture the belief among such poorly-educated people as these that they were the victims of blood-sucking bats - the notion of vampirism is very ancient and widespread in human cultures worldwide (the Maya of pre-Columbian Mesoamerica even worshipped the vampire bat as a god - Camazotz).           

Camazotz, as conceived by Hodari Nundu (© Hodari Nundu/Deviantart)

Two other medical explanations for the death bird case were also raised by Hill during our correspondence (although he rated both of these as being less plausible than the likelihood of a parasite-borne disease's involvement). These are as follows.

As Devil's Cave contained large quantities of bat excrement, perhaps these droppings harboured the spores of the soil fungus Histoplasma capsulatum (even though this is more usually associated with bird guano). If inhaled, these spores can cause an infection of the lungs known as histoplasmosis, which can prove fatal (but severe cases are not common).

Alternatively, an illness called Weil's disease again offers some notable parallels with the 'death bird syndrome'. Also referred to as epidemic spirochaetal jaundice and as leptospirosis icterohaemorrhagica, Weil's disease is caused by spirochaete bacteria of the genus Leptospira, and is usually spread by rodents, but the bacteria have been found in a few species of bat too. Infection generally occurs through infected drinking water, and among the ensuing symptoms of contraction is the appearance of small haemorrhages in the skin, which could be mistaken for bites. Also, the accompanying damage to the kidneys and liver, jaundice, and overall malaise experienced by sufferers could explain the goatherds' haggard, wasted form.

Clearly, then, the case of the dreaded death bird and the stricken herders is far from being as straightforward as it seemed on first sight, and may involve any one, or perhaps even more than one, of the above solutions. Also well worth noting is that de Prorok was (in)famous for gross exaggeration and imaginative narratives, so it is by no means evident how much of his testimony concerning his visit and experiences relating to Devil's Cave can be taken as fact.

Micrograph showing histoplasmosis. Liver biopsy. Periodic acid-Schiff diastase (PAS-D) stain. Histoplasma = clumps of small bright red circles (© Nephron/Wikipedia – CC BY-SA 3.0 licence)

One aspect of the case that is evident, however, is the necessity for a specimen of the death bird to be collected and formally studied. Only then might the resolution of this mystifying and macabre cryptozoological riddle be finally achieved.

Yet in view of the perennially uncertain political climate associated with Ethiopia in modern times, even this is unlikely to prove an easy task to accomplish.

Until then, the secret of this purportedly deadly, unidentified creature will remain as dark and impenetrable as the grim cave from which its winged minions allegedly issue forth each night to perform their vile abominations upon the latest tragic campful of doomed, defenceless goatherds.

This ShukerNature article is excerpted and updated from my book The Beasts That Hide From Man.

THE AHOOL AND THE OLITIAU – GIANT MYSTERY BATS ON THE WING?

Photograph of hammer-headed bat currently doing the online rounds on social media (© owner presently unknown to me – reproduced here in a strictly non-commercial Fair Use basis for educational, review purposes only)

During the past couple of days, several internet friends and colleagues have independently brought the above photograph to my attention, asking me whether the creature portrayed in it is real or photoshopped. I can confirm that it is indeed real – it is a specimen of tropical Africa's hammer-headed bat – but due to the optical illusion of forced perspective, i.e. caused by it being positioned much closer to the camera than is the person holding it, this very distinctive-looking bat appears much bigger than it really is.

Nevertheless, seeing this photograph reminds me of what may be some genuinely giant mystery bats, and regarding one of which the hammer-headed bat has indeed been considered as a possible explanation – so here they are.

Taxiderm specimen of a hammer-headed bat (© Dr Karl Shuker)

Native to New Guinea and the Bismark Archipelago, the world's largest known species of modern-day bat is the Bismark fruit bat Pteropus neohibernicus, which sports an extremely impressive wingspan of up to approximately 5.5 ft, and there are several other fruit bat species with sizeable spans too. Moreover, quoting from the third (most recent) edition of the late Gerald L. Wood's still-invaluable source of animal superlatives The Guinness Book of Animal Facts and Feats:

According to Peterson (1964)* a huge example of P. neohibernicus from New Guinea preserved in the American Museum of Natural History, New York, has a head and body length of 455 mm 17.9 in and a span of 1.65 m 5 ft 5 in. He thinks that some unmeasured specimens may reach 183 m 6 ft, but this figure is unconfirmed.

*Peterson (1964) = Russell F. Peterson, Silently, By Night (McGraw-Hill: New York, 1964), an authoritative book on the natural history of bats, a copy of which I own.

However, the cryptozoological chronicles contain details concerning at least two types of giant mystery bats whose wingspan is claimed to be twice as big as the above!

Famous vintage photo of a fruit bat (species unnamed) with a very impressive wingspan (originally © Otto Webb, now public domain? – reproduced here on a strictly non-commercial, Fair Use basis for educational, review purposes only)

The secluded river valleys of western Java in Indonesia are reputedly home to one of these - an enormous but very elusive bat known to the local people as the ahool. It derives its name from the sound of its unmistakeable cry, which it is said to utter three times in succession while on the wing at night.

When questioned by interested Westerners, the locals provide consistent descriptions of the ahool. It has a monkey-like head and flattened humanoid face, a body as big as a one-year-old child's, and a massive 12-ft wingspan. It feeds principally upon large fishes that it snatches from underneath stones on river beds, but is occasionally encountered crouching on the forest floor, whereupon its feet are said to point backward. This last-mentioned feature may initially sound bizarre and implausible, but in reality it actually provides support for believing the remainder of their description, because as bat experts will readily testify, bats' feet do point backwards. Even when hanging upside-down from a branch, a bat wraps its feet around the rear portion of the branch, with its feet curling towards the observer, instead of away from him.

Does a giant bat, or bat-like cryptid, still awaiting scientific discovery explain reports of the ahool? (© Dr Karl Shuker)

One of the most interesting encounters with an ahool comes not from an eyewitness but rather an 'earwitness' (whose testimony was first documented by American cryptozoologist Ivan T. Sanderson in a number of publications). The son of an eminent zoologist, naturalist Dr Ernst Bartels had spent much of his early life in Java, and was well-acquainted with the cries of all of the island's fauna. He was also familiar with the local Sundanese testimony concerning the ahool, but had remained sceptical – until one evening in 1927.

At around 11.30 pm, Dr Bartels had been lying awake in bed inside his thatched house near western Java's Tjidjenkol River, listening to the nocturnal insects' incessant orchestra of noises, when suddenly, from directly overhead, he heard a single loud, clear cry – "A-hool!". A few moments later, he heard it again, but further away now. Immediately, he jumped out of bed, grabbed his torch, and raced outside in the direction of the cry, whereupon he heard it again, for a third and final time, floating back to him from a considerable distance downstream. He stood there, totally transfixed, not because he didn't know what had made this unique triple cry, but rather because he did!

An olitiau encounter (© William M. Rebsamen)

A mystery bat of equally dramatic dimensions has also been encountered in Cameroon, West Africa, and by two very experienced scientific observer, as now described here.

 

While participating in the famous Percy Sladen Expedition of 1932, the afore-mentioned Ivan T. Sanderson and fellow animal-collector Gerald Russell had been wading down a stream in Cameroon's Assumbo Mountains one evening in search of tortoises to collect when abruptly a jet-black creature with enormous wings and a flattened monkey-like face flew out of the darkness and directly towards Sanderson, its lower jaw hanging down, revealing an abundance of large white teeth.

 

 

Is this what the olitiau looks like? (created by me using Magic Studio)

Sanderson instinctively ducked, then he and Russell fired a number of shots in the direction of this terrifying apparition, but it merely wheeled out of range and vanished back into the darkness, its wings cutting through the still air with a loud hissing sound. The two men agreed that its wingspan was at least 12 ft, and it seemed to have been jet-black in colour.

 

When they told the local hunters back at their camp what had happened, the hunters were all terrified – so much so that after informing the naturalists that their would-be attacker was known as the olitiau, they all fled from the camp!

Exquisite 19^th-Century engraving of the hammer-headed bat (public domain)

Sceptics later sought to identify the olitiau as a grotesque species of fruit bat known as the hammer-headed bat Hypsignathus monstrosus. As its name reveals, however, the head and face of this species is extremely long and swollen – wholly dissimilar from the flattened, monkey-like face specifically described by Sanderson and Russell.

A giant bat-like entity has also been reported from Ghana, where it is known as the sasabonsam. In 1939, a report of a dead specimen was published in the West African Review journal, together with a photograph of an alleged carving of one such beast, which depicted it with relatively short wings and a bearded, humanoid face.

Sketch based upon the above-mentioned photograph of an alleged carving of a sasabonsam (© Dr Karl Shuker)

There are two suborders of bats – the mega-bats (constituting the fruit bats), which include most of the largest species; and the micro-bats (constituting all of the other bats), many of which are much smaller. Consequently, we might expect bats with 12-ft wingspans to be more closely allied to the mega-bats than to the micro-bats. In reality, however, the reverse may well be true.

The flattened monkey or humanoid face of the ahool and the olitiau is particularly interesting, because this is very different from the long-muzzled, distinctly fox-like faces of the fruit bats (hence their alternative name of flying fox), but similar to those of many micro-bats. How extraordinary and zoologically iconoclastic it would be if the world's largest bat species ultimately proved not to be mega-bats but micro-bats!

The flap-ornamented but still unequivocally flat face of a micro-bat – namely, the Antillean ghost-faced bat Mormoops blainvillii (public domain)

Finally: several striking photographs of people holding seemingly enormous bats via their outstretched wings can be readily accessed on the internet. However, close examination of these reveals that in each instance the bat – invariably a fruit bat, some species of which are already fairly large – is being held much closer to the camera than the person who is holding it. As with the hammer-headed bat photograph opening this ShukerNature article, these images are merely clever examples of forced perspective.

So, sadly, if we want to discover a bona fide giant bat, we must look for it not online but rather in the riverside jungles of Africa, or listen out for its unique triple cry amid the shadowy forests of Java.

A selection of sourceless online photographs of supposedly giant bats that in reality are nothing more than examples of forced perspective (© owners presently unknown to me – reproduced here on a strictly non-commercial Fair Use basis for educational, review purposes only)

For more information concerning the ahool, olitiau, sasabonsam, and other crypto-bats, be sure to check out my book The Beasts That Hide From Man.