Save Painted Woolly Bats from senseless slaughter

A major victory was scored in the effort to end the online, ornamental trade in bats

Although the use of wildlife for ornaments is not new, the large-scale harvesting and fashioning of animals into curios is a growing phenomenon, exacerbated by e-commerce.

Together with other conservation scientists, we flagged concern about the conservation threat posed by online ornamental trade to painted woolly bats Kerivoula picta.

Investigations into the online trade of this species on USA's three biggest shopping websites: Amazon, eBay and Etsy (Coleman et al., 2024, European Journal of Wildlife Research, 70, 75) suggest that in 2022 alone, hundreds of K. picta were imported into the USA illegally.

Prior to the publication of that paper, these findings were communicated to the Center for Biological Diversity, and together with the Monitor Conservation Research Society, submitted a petition to add K. picta to the U.S. Endangered Species Act to raise border scrutiny and reduce USA imports of ornamental bats. Surrounding this, an active effort was made to publicise the petiton as well as the deceptive nature of the advertisements, which resulted in media coverage and heightened public awareness.

We are pleased to report that by mid-August 2024, eBay and Etsy had removed all bat listings from their platforms worldwide and in the USA, respectively, with both companies implementing concrete policies prohibiting bat trade.

This highlights the power of conservation communication. 

What's next?

- Address supply chains in Southeast Asia

- Advocate for K. picta to be listed on CITES at the 2025 Conference of the Parties.

Thank you for supporting our work!

Links:

• Conservation News, Oryx

As a result of the work of a group of organisations united in the aim to better protect the Painted Woolly Bat from such frivolous trade, of which Monitor is a part of, Etsy has removed all bat advertisements from its platform in the US, while Ebay has done the same globally. We hope Etsy will also follow suit and extend the ban beyond the US borders.

We are proud to be a part of this effort, and of note is a petition from Monitor and the Centre for Biological Diversity to the US government to list the Painted Woolly Bat in the Endangered Species Act. We are particularly glad as well of the media and public attention on this issue and feel encouraged that the future is brighter for this beautiful little bat.

Thank you for your support as we continue to address the trade in the Painted Woolly Bat in different parts of the world.

Links:

• Petition for Endangered Species Act inclusion
• Revelator article (Coleman & Shepherd)