The San Diego Zoo Safari Park has another miracle baby in its nursery. This one is a critically endangered Rodrigues fruit bat pup that was born by emergency C-section on Jan. 11. The male pup is named Lucas (“Luc” for short), and he is alive and thriving at the Safari Park’s Ione and Paul Harter Animal Care Center.

The pup’s journey started when bat keepers noticed that Patty, a first-time mother, was having labor difficulties. She was taken to the Paul Harter Veterinary Medical Center, where veterinarians performed the first-ever emergency C-section on a Rodrigues fruit bat. Unfortunately, Patty did not survive the procedure.

Luc, who is the 14th pup to be born at the Safari Park, is only the second Rodrigues fruit bat ever to be hand reared at the nursery. Patty — who was born in March 2013 — was the first.

While visitors to the Safari Park will be able to see the new arrival in the Animal Care Center nursery in the near future, he is currently spending all of his time in an incubator, attached to a “sock mom” that mimics a fruit bat mother. To keep his body temperature regulated and his wings pliable, the incubator temperature is set between 85 and 89 degrees Fahrenheit, with 75 percent humidity.


Animal care staff members feed him human infant formula inside the incubator every two hours. After feedings, he is bathed with a damp cotton ball, dried off and wrapped in a warm blanket, which stands in for the mother’s cradling wings.

The critically endangered Rodrigues fruit bat is only found on Rodrigues Island, which is about 300 miles east of Madagascar. The fruit-bat numbers dwindled as locals cut down the tamarind and mango trees that provided the sociable bats’ favorite food. After a 2003 cyclone destroyed their habitat and swept many bats out to sea, the population dropped to about 4,000.

The San Diego Zoo Safari Park has established a breeding colony, and 17 Rodrigues fruit bats can be seen at the park’s Bat House.


Twitter: @karla_peterson

karla.peterson@sduniontribune.com