Bats Ride Nightdrafts To Join The Mile High Club – IFLScience

For all the wonders of flight, most animals that have mastered it stay quite close to the ground. Exceptions are mostly birds of prey that ride thermal drafts high into the sky without using up precious energy flapping. So detections of a few bat species at heights of 1.6 kilometers (1 mile) up have made zoologists wonder how they got there. The answer apparently lies in updrafts created when wind hits hillsides.
Even for strong fliers, it takes a lot of energy to gain altitude without help. On…

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