distribution and new records of cavedwelling bats in the central zagros mountains, lorestan province, iran

Data on distribution and fauna of cave-dwelling bat species from iran is infrequent.recent studies in certain parts of the country especially the western and southwesternregions demonstrated a high level of species richness for chiropteran fauna. sincelorestan province is located in the middle of zagros mountain ranges, and a considerablenumber of bat species are living in the adjacent provinces; it is expected that lorestanalso harbors a great number of bat species. in the present study, 49 caves wereinvestigated of which 48 caves were found to be occupied by 1 to 3 bat species. bats wereidentified using identification keys, measured, photographed, and then released. a totalnumber of 68 records from 11 species was documented in this study. the identifiedspecies include rhinopoma hardwickii, r. muscatellum and r. microphyllum from familyrhinopomatidae, rhinolophus ferrumequinum, rh. hipposideros, rh. euryale, rh. mehelyi and rh.blasii from family rhinolophidae, myotis blythii and m. capaccinii from vespertilionidaefamily, and miniopterus pallidus from miniopteridae family. rhinolophus ferrumequinum with19 observation records had the highest distributional range. furthermore, the biggestcolony comprising several thousands of individuals of r. microphyllum was observed inkhofash cave. myotis capaccinii, rhinopoma microphyllum, rhinolophus blasii, and rh. mehelyiwere observed for the first time in lorestan province.