The Case For Vampire Bats

In Latin America, vampire bats drink the blood of big animals and spread the deadly rabies virus. Cows die. People die. Ranchers want them exterminated. But scientists are discovering these bats not only have weird abilities - they also form human-like friendships. Does that mean they should be protected? Or would the world be better without them? ↓↓ Links & Info ↓↓ SUBMIT A QUESTION HERE: http://www.npr.org/skunkbear SUBSCRIBE: http://bit.ly/2dH6fpR TUMBLR:   / skunkbear   TWITTER:   / nprskunkbear   To learn more about Gerry Carter's research on the social behavior of vampire bats: https://socialbat.org For More Info on bats and other interesting critters: The Smithsonian Tropical Research Institute: http://www.stri.si.edu/ Credits: Produced by Ryan Kellman and Adam Cole (@cadamole) Senior Editors: Alison Richards and Andrea Kissack Supervising Editor: Anne Gudenkauf Tree loss map courtesy of Global Forest Watch (http://www.globalforestwatch.org/map) Infrared footage courtesy of Gerry Carter and Rob Mies Bat tongue: Marco Tschapka et. al. (http://advances.sciencemag.org/conten...) Echolocation: Melville J. Wohlgemuth et. al. (http://journals.plos.org/plosbiology/...) Bat capturing moths: Aaron Corcoran (   • Bat echolocating and capturing moths  ) Wolves: Sicmanta (https://vimeo.com/105686970) Copyright © 2017 NPR. All rights reserved. Visit our website terms of use for further information. https://www.npr.org/about-npr/1798768... For permission to reuse this video, visit our permissions pages at npr.org https://www.npr.org/about-npr/1798815... Music Credits: "At Home With Me" Kuatois, Lee, Mage, and Smith/First Digital Music "It's All Here" Adrian Williams/BBC Music Productions "Hell Freezes Over" Patrick Sturrock and Marc Williams/ZFC Music "Two Hermanos" Alec Milstein and Ron Cohen/First Digital Music BMI "Shimmering Oasis" Miguel D'Oliveira/BBC Production Music "Rise Into The Sun" by Anthony Phillips/Chappell Recorded Music Library Ltd PRS SFX from amazing Freesound.org users: rhumphries man arctura erh timbre bmaczero qat stevenbrown karma-ron tjandrasounds abouch joebro10 13gpanska-gorbusinova-anna thenudo martian deku karma-ron keweldog omar-alvarado_ everheat spoonbender amholma cally06 lunchmoney stubb lth-stp zott820 aldenroth2 psychopancake kingsrow fluffayfish xdimebagx nemodaedalus laurent benboncan_ tomlija samule44 zozzy tdes benboncan lxx-70 miekyj kwahmah ecfike ianoboe tran5ient inspectorj yellowbear