Pictures of a rare bat that looks like a dog are going viral on various social media platforms. Social media users are confused whether it is a dog with wings or a bat with dog face.
The pictures have been doing rounds on social media after a Twitter user posted on his handle.
The photo was shared by Twitter user @emotionalpedant who wrote, “Since we’re posting weird bats, this is Buettikofer’s epauletted fruit bat, a megabat that frankly has no business flying around with a dog’s face.”
This isn’t any kind of mutation. Buettikofer’s epauletted fruit bats exist. They are a species of megabat.
The viral photo has collected over 23,300 likes and 5,400 retweets. While many people felt unsettled at the sight of the photo, others couldn’t believe their eyes and searched the Internet for more images of the Buettikofer’s epauletted fruit bat.
One user said, “Jesus Christ. I know your tweet SAYS what this is but that didn’t stop me from shrieking “WHAT IS THAT?!?!” and looking it up anyway.”
A third user commented, “Okay I was so unsettled by this that I looked up other photos and yeah, that bat has the head of a dog.”
Buettikofer’s epauletted fruit bat is a species of megabat in the family Pteropodidae. It is found in Ivory Coast, Ghana, Guinea, Guinea-Bissau, Liberia, Nigeria, Senegal, and Sierra Leone. Its natural habitats are subtropical or tropical moist lowland forests, dry savanna, and moist savanna. It is threatened by habitat loss.