Book 1, Question 46
Why Do Bats Use Sound to Hunt? Echoes in the Dark!
Night is hard to hunt in by eye, so bats use sound! They make high-pitched clicks with their mouth or nose, and the clicks bounce back as echoes. The echoes work like a moving map, telling the bat where an insect is, how far away it is, and which way it is moving. The page says a bat can find an insect in the dark from up to 10 meters away. Try clapping in a hallway and then outside to hear how echoes change.
From the book
Page from A Million Whys Book 1
More fun facts
- Using echoes, bats can detect objects as thin as a human hair in complete darkness.
- Echolocation helps bats find insects as small as mosquitoes, a favorite food for many bats.
- From the echoes, a bat can tell where an object is, how big it is, and what shape it is.
- Most bat calls are ultrasonic, which means they are too high for people to hear.
- More than a thousand kinds of animals echolocate, including most bats and all toothed whales.
- Echolocation works great in the ocean, where sound travels about five times faster than in air.
- Some animals echolocate in surprising ways, from vibrating their throats to flapping their wings.
Sources: ASU, National Geographic
Questions kids ask
Can people hear bat calls?
Mostly no. Echolocation calls are usually ultrasonic, too high for human ears.
Do other animals use echolocation?
Yes. More than a thousand kinds do, including all toothed whales, like dolphins.