This photograph of a massive bat is currently making its way around social media. The image in question shows a massive bat hanging from a roof. Some suggested that the image may be fake, but others came to its defense, with various websites able to prove its authenticity.
While there is some confusion over the species of bat photographed, the general consensus is that the picture shows a giant golden crowned flying fox. Also known as the golden-capped fruit bat, this species of megabat is endemic to the Philippines.
Lisa B
Wow! ?
Renee S
Cool!
Eric S
It’s a prop from a movie. Francis Ford Coppola’s “Dracula” (1992), and the picture of the prop has been photoshopped into the garage in the picture on the web. The prop was made for that scene where Dracula, played by Gary Oldman, appears as a big bat to scare his English pursuers. Rather than get Gary all made up again as the bat just to shoot the one shot of him hanging from the ceiling, the prop department made this giant fake bat out of neoprene and they used camera tricks to make it appear full size. It’s really only three feet tall.
Just for laughs Coppola used to hang it in the rafters of his high ceilinged tasting room at his northern California vineyard. People would come in to taste the wine, then someone would glance up and scream because here was this monster bat hanging over their heads.
Mark R
These are real bro…
hickory67
Don’t know about the veracity of the photo…would suspect Eric S’ comments above are correct. Nonetheless, I have seen those bats in the Philippines, while running PT around Subic Bay. When I first saw them, I thought it was a tree with black foliage – there were thousands of them! When the sun went down they literally filled the sky like some horror movie, but it was amazing to watch them go out for the night’s hunt.
http://www.batcon.org/resources/media-education/bats-magazine/bat_article/1526
Eric S
Reply to hickory67 You can see exactly what you describe in the movie “The Bridge On The River Kwai”. A gunshot stirs thousands of them out of the trees, and before they looked like some kind of hanging fruit.
Charles R
You are a wealth of knowledge on this, thanks Eric.
Eric S
Shucks… thanks Charles. T’weren’t nuthin’. It’s just that I seen a bunch of movies is all. Not so many lately, though. Don’t really get what the ‘superhero’ thing is all about. Gimme your ‘Casablanca’ and ‘Citizen Kane’ and ‘Network’ and I can expound all day about referential variables. That’s a term the swells in Hollywood like to use to make themselves look smart, ‘referential variables’. But don’t pay them no nevermind… and we all will live happier lives.
Janetta V
Boy you are right up my alley. Totally agree.
hickory67
Oh that’s cool – I’ll have to give that one a look. I remember asking “what the hell kinda tree is that?” The Corporal that was leading PT said “them’s bats, dummy, keep runnin'” lol…
Mark R
Oh ja, these big fella’s. I seen one of these guy’s flying around when I was kicking back on a landing craft going from Grande Island to Subic when I was a sailor in the P.I. back in 1988 That sucker had like a 5 foot wingspan and was huge.. I aint never seen a bat like that since then.. 🙂