NATURAL HISTORY · CATALOGUE RECORD
Lesser False Vampire Bat
Megaderma spasma (Linnaeus, 1758)
Source-backed taxonomic record
Accepted species in Catalogue of Life’s 11 September 2026 base release. This preserves the source classification and available supporting data; it is not a completed species monograph.
Open encyclopedia reference
The lesser false vampire bat (Megaderma spasma) is a bat found in South Asia and Southeast Asia from Sri Lanka and India in the west to Indonesia and the Philippines in the east. They live in caves and tree hollows. They are insectivorous.
Wikipedia contributors, Lesser false vampire bat; see linked history · CC BY-SA 4.0 . Plain-text lead excerpt, at most 180 words; no infobox or later sections Retrieved 2026-10-05T12:39:53.569668+00:00. This reference remains separate from the taxonomic record.
Identity & source status
- Scientific name
- Megaderma spasma (Linnaeus, 1758)
- Name authority
- (Linnaeus, 1758)
- Common name
- Lesser False Vampire Bat
- Rank
- species
- Accepted status
- accepted
- Kingdom
- Animalia
- Phylum
- Chordata
- Class
- Mammalia
- Order
- Chiroptera
- Family
- Megadermatidae
- Genus
- Megaderma
- Extinction status
- Recorded extant
Classification family tree
Nested taxonomic groups from the source. This is not a direct-ancestor chain, a dated evolutionary tree or a phylogenetic reconstruction.
- domainEukaryota (Chatton, 1925) Whittaker & Margulis, 1978
- kingdomAnimalia
- phylumChordata
- subphylumVertebrata
- infraphylumGnathostomata
- parvphylumOsteichthyes
- megaclassTetrapoda
- classMammalia Linnaeus, 1758
- subclassTheria Parker & Haswell, 1897
- infraclassEutheria Gill, 1872
- orderChiroptera Blumenbach, 1779
- suborderYinpterochiroptera Springer, Teeling, Madsen, Stanhope & Jong, 2001
- superfamilyRhinolophoidea Gray, 1825
- familyMegadermatidae H. Allen, 1864
- genusMegaderma É. Geoffroy Saint-Hilaire, 1810
- speciesMegaderma spasma (Linnaeus, 1758)
Close classified relatives
No other member of this genus is present in the selected snapshot.
Names & synonyms
Names explicitly linked to this accepted taxon in the source. Synonymy can change with revision.
| Recorded name | Source status |
|---|---|
| Vespertilio spasma Linnaeus, 1758 Linnaeus, 1758 | synonym |
Documented distribution
Source distribution statements, not a complete range map. A listed locality is not necessarily a place of origin.
Source literature & publication evidence
References attached to this source record, including nomenclatural citations where supplied. This is a selected bibliography; abbreviated citations remain in the source’s form.
- https://www.itis.gov/servlet/SingleRpt/SingleRpt?search_topic=TSN&search_value=631756 Source fields: Taxon.tsv dwc:namePublishedIn, Taxon.tsv dcterms:references
Origins, evidence & remaining research
Name authority and publication references document nomenclature where the source supplies it. They do not establish evolutionary origins or the earliest fossil occurrence.
Specimen-level evidence, morphology, ecological research, phylogenetic studies, a comprehensive bibliography and a located literary passage have not yet been compiled for this record. A suitable sourced image remains to be added.
Dataset citation & attribution
This exact taxon in ChecklistBank · Catalogue of Life 2026-09-11
Catalogue of Life 2026-09-11; dataset 316321; doi:10.48580/dgz5n. https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ . Retrieved 5 October 2026.
Stable key: col:3YTFZ. Classification follows source parent identifiers. English common names may vary by region.