This mahogany-furred tree bat sits near the northern edge of its range in North Carolina, and the state’s records concentrate in the warmer pine and hardwood forests of the southeastern Coastal Plain. That region’s mild winters and abundant Spanish moss give it the roosting cover it needs at a latitude where the species starts to thin out.
It roosts by day tucked into clumps of Spanish moss or dense pine and hardwood foliage rather than in caves or buildings, a habit that keeps individual bats well hidden and hard to census even where they’re present. That’s part of why a species this dependent on warm-climate forest cover shows up in only a couple dozen North Carolina records so far.
Reports run through the year with a spring peak in May and June, tracking when bats are most active and most likely to be recorded rather than any real surge in numbers. NatureServe lists the species vulnerable in the state, consistent with its position at the cooler northern fringe of where it can find suitable roosting habitat.
