Isabel Dietz

TL;DR: There was no correlation between RF and these body size parameters within a sex or age class for any of the species, suggesting that RF is not a reliable honest signal for intraspecific communication that would indicate the quality of a potential mate or competitor.

TL;DR: It is argued that both size and shape are likely to play a role for niche separation between species, and both sexual and geographic variation within species are found.

TL;DR: Growth characteristics of horseshoe bats in northern Bulgaria provide the first evidence for an influence of climate on the growth of individuals in the centre of the species’ distributions, and a clear relationship between the climatic conditions prevailing in each year and the final size of individuals born respectively in those years is found.

TL;DR: The first records of this species are described from Germany, Poland, Albania, and from the European part of Turkey, including the northernmost locality in central Germany, suggesting that the species probably has a more continuous and wider distribution than currently known and might be expected to occur even further to the North.

TL;DR: It is suggested that banding of horseshoe bats should be limited to well defined projects and only used if the study populations are in a good preservation condition and long term effects of the marking method can be monitored.