Artificial light from streetlamps is interrupting the natural foraging habits of fruit-eating bats in Costa Rica and damaging the area's ecosystem in the process.
A new study has shown that the bats prefer to gather their fruit in the darkness and avoid artificial light, meaning that some areas won't be sprinkled with seeds, BBC News reported.
"Policymakers of tropical countries should become aware of the potential detrimental effects of artificial lighting on wildlife and ecosystem functioning," the study's co-authors wrote.
The bats are a natural way to further reforestation after stretches of rainforest are turned into agricultural land, but their eating habits are disturbed by the streetlamps.
While the animals "tolerate habitat disturbance when dispersing seeds," they don't like artificial light, according to the study, which was published in the Journal of Applied Ecology.
"Under naturally dark conditions, bats produce a copious seed rain--even in deforested habitats and connect distant forest fragments," the researchers wrote.
"Yet, artificial light at night may compromise bat-mediated seed dispersal if bats avoided lit areas."
Study co-authors Daniel Lewanzik and Christian C. Voigt found that "artificial light altered the foraging behaviour of fruit-eating bats."
Working with Sowell's short-tailed bats (Carollia sowelli), they experimented with different types of lighting to see what influenced bats to consume food or leave it alone.
"We found that [fruits] were less likely to be harvested when plants were illuminated by a street lamp than under natural darkness," the researchers said.
The team recommended that countries establish "light-free refuges" to stop disturbing the bats, which are an essential part of the rainforest ecosystem.
"In tropical habitats, bat-mediated seed dispersal is necessary for the rapid succession of deforested land because few other animals than bats disperse seeds into open habitats," said Lewanzik, as reported by BBC News.
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