A world without bats would look very different than the one you know — and not for the better.

With more than 1,400 species located all around the globe, bats play a substantial ecological role that is vital to the health of our natural ecosystem and human economies.

Here are just a few of the important ways bats enrich our lives:

They pollinate, disperse, and protect valuable cash crops, including bananas, guava, durians, cashews, dates, figs, cacao, sugar, corn, cotton, and agave (the kind we need to make tequila!)

Fruit-eating bats in the tropics disperse seeds that are critical to restoring cleared or damaged rainforests

Bat poop, known as guano, is a valuable natural fertilizer with far-reaching benefits to landowners and communities

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