How long do bats live?
The oldest bat caught in the wild was a banded little brown bat (Myotis lucifugus) which was 34 years old at the time of recapture. To put this in perspective, a bat living longer than 30 years is equivalent to a human living longer than 100 years. Bats, for their size, are the world’s longest-lived mammals. Yet unlike other mammals of their size, bats have very low reproductive rates, females of most species producing just one pup per year.
