The Grey-headed Flying-fox is a megabat, and one of the largest and most familiar bats. It feeds on flowering and fruiting plants and is important for pollinating and dispersing seeds of many native plants. Each night they travel to foraging areas up to 15km from their ‘camp’, returning before dawn. The camps, of hundreds or thousands, are often in gullies close to water, with a dense canopy of trees.

They spend most of the day hanging from branches with wings wrapped blanket-like around their bodies. Usually a single baby is born around October and is carried by its mother for the first month, and then left in the camp to be suckled when the mother returns at dawn.

Size: 255mm Conservation status: V= V, FFG= L, EPBC= VU

Illustration: Mark Trinham