Journal of Advanced Zoology ISSN: 0253-7214 Volume 44 Issue S-5 Year 2023 Page 150:157 ________________________________________________________________________________________________________________ - 150 - Prediction of Foraging Strategy Through The Wing Morphology of Three Forest Fruit Bats L. Jeya Praba 1 , I. Viji Margaret 2 , D. Addline 3 , S. Nirmala 4 , Viji Siva Sakthi 5 1,2,3,4,5 Zoology Department and Research Centre, Sarah Tucker College (Autonomous), Affiliated to Manonmaniam Sundaranar University, Tirunelveli-627007, Tamil Nadu, India. *Corresponding Author: L. Jeya Praba Email: jayaprabha2009@gmail.com Article History Received: 26 June 2023 Revised: 03 Sept 2023 Accepted: 07 Oct 2023 CC License CC-BY-NC-SA 4.0 Abstract Wing morphology is an important indicator of the foraging ecology of bats, as they may constrain the foraging habitats bat can use, the types of food items that they can detect, and how those resources are perceived. The fruit eating bats differ from insect eating bats in their foraging patterns. Low aspect ratio, short wingspan and high wing loading in respect to that of the body size has provided them with commuting foraging flights covering wider area. Three of the megachiropterans species of the present study shown remarkable variation in their flight patterns depending on their wing morphology. But all of them show broad wing with high wing loading enabling them to attain a moderate flight speed which provide them sufficient foraging time and long-distance commuting flight. But they show variation in their wingspan, aspect ratio and wing tip length and wing tip shape. This variation helps each one of them to attain species-specific manoevrability flight in cluttered area, low cost of transport and agility. This variation in turn reflects their foraging pattern and selection of food items. The present study has made an attempt to focus on the variation in the wing morphology of three forest fruit and correlated with foraging strategy. Keywords – Wing morphology, aspect ratio, wing span, wing loading, fruit bats and foraging pattern 1. Introduction Flying animals require different wing designs and energy expenditures (1). Variation in the wing shape of bats results in different flight demands. Flight adaptation in bats allows them to radiate widely to adopt highly specialized tropic strategies (2). Bats are more highly diversified in their feeding strategies than any other mammalian order. A strong relationship between wing morphology, habitat structure, and foraging strategy (3-5), and between tropic characters and dietary niche (6-9) has been demonstrated in multiple taxonomic groups and local assemblages. Knowledge about the diet of an organism is essential for a study in ecology and behaviour of any organism. Such dietary information is essential for proper management and conservation of any species (10). The dietary adaptations of bats are commonly reflected in the morphology of their wing (flight apparatus). Body mass, wingspan and wing area are the primary measures of design in flying organisms. From these parameters, wing loading and aspect ratio are derived, which describe the size and shape of the wings respectively (11). The study on the wing morphology of bats will reveal their foraging strategy and food selection (12). So, it is needed to study the wing morphology in terms of aerodynamic principles which has its impact on the foraging behaviour of bat species. Only a few studies have approached the relationship among feeding behaviour and morphological diversity of wing in these flying mammals. The present study is an attempt to investigate the wing morphology of three forest fruit bats. The observations on the wing morphology have been co-related with their foraging strategy. 2. Materials And Methods The diversity in the morphology and its impact on the ecology of the three fruit bats Cynopterus brachyotis, Latidens salimalii and Eonecteris spelaea were assessed by studying the flight apparatus. The flight