Rediscovery of a Lost Species
A Nigerian biologist has rediscovered a bat species thought extinct since the 1970s, turning a PhD field expedition into a landmark conservation breakthrough. Iroro Tanshi, then a doctoral researcher, was trapping near a roost in the Afi Mountain Wildlife Sanctuary in south-east Nigeria in 2016 when she caught a bat that looked “very, very different” from the others. “Big-eared,” she recalled. A quick check of her identification guide revealed the creature between her fingers was Hipposideros curtus, the short-tailed roundleaf bat — a species that had not been recorded in the wild for more than four decades.
The moment was electrifying. “That was the moment that changed everything,” Tanshi said. “There was the catching and the moment of realisation, like: ‘Oh my gosh.’” Spurred by the discovery, Tanshi and her team of local assistants set up harp traps and mist nets across the cave networks of the Afi sanctuary and the nearby Cross River National Park. Over a gruelling survey they found 15 more individuals, confirming that Nigeria now hosts the only known actively roosting population of this endangered bat.
The short-tailed roundleaf bat is extraordinarily delicate — it weighs about the same as a level teaspoonful of salt. Unlike large fruit bats, it has small eyes and a large, intricately folded nose that it uses to navigate total darkness through echolocation. It is highly sensitive to noise and bright light; Tanshi typically uses red light during fieldwork, switching it on only briefly. “You put it on for a short time and turn it off again to kind of see your way or see the bat that’s hanging there,” she said.
For decades, the species was thought to exist only in forest caves in Cameroon and Equatorial Guinea. By the 2010s, all previously documented roosts had been erased by human activities such as deforestation and hunting, leading scientists to fear the bat had quietly gone extinct — until Tanshi’s discovery.
Cultural Stigma and Hunting: A Deadly Combination
The rediscovery was only the beginning. Tanshi soon noticed a troubling imbalance in conservation priorities. While the sanctuary’s primates — gorillas, drill monkeys — were treated with respect and local people reported anyone who killed them, bats were “heavily hunted”, even inside the protected area. “People were very familiar with the need to protect nature and conserve these animals,” Tanshi said. “You couldn’t kill those animals in the village without getting reported. But everything else was up for grabs.”
Historically, bats in Nigeria have been burdened by negative stereotypes, commonly linked to witchcraft and bad omens. Their association with health emergencies such as the Ebola outbreak and Covid-19 has deepened the prejudice. “Bats can’t catch a break, sadly,” Tanshi said, describing the cultural perception as a “complex scenario”. Amid this broader aversion, some communities treat bats as ordinary food. In the remote village of Abia, about 70km (45 miles) from the Afi sanctuary, the straw-coloured fruit bat is regarded as “normal bushmeat for us, like fish and chicken in other places”, according to a villager, Judith Ojong. Bats for meat are typically sold in fours for 5,000 naira — roughly £2.70. The straw-coloured fruit bat is one of Africa’s most heavily hunted bat species, and the practice not only drives population declines but, scientists warn, also carries public health risks due to the potential transmission of zoonotic diseases.
Tanshi and her collaborator, bat specialist Dr Benneth Obitte, have made changing these perceptions a central part of their work. By highlighting the ecological importance of bats — as pollinators, seed dispersers and natural pest controllers — they aim to foster appreciation for the often-misunderstood creatures.
A Campaign Against Wildfires and Habitat Loss
The short-tailed roundleaf bat is classified as Endangered on the IUCN Red List, with an estimated population of fewer than 1,500 individuals. Its survival is under threat from multiple directions: deforestation, logging, agricultural expansion and urban development constantly erode the ancient rainforests of Afi Mountain and Cross River National Park, which are among Africa’s oldest and also shelter Cross River gorillas, Nigeria-Cameroon chimpanzees and drills. Human-induced wildfires, often started by farmers clearing land, pose an additional severe threat, destroying forest cover, disrupting food sources and altering the microclimates bats depend on.
In 2016, Tanshi and Obitte co-founded the Small Mammal Conservation Organisation (Smacon) to champion bats, rodents and other small creatures. The following year they launched the Zero Wildfire Campaign, an innovative community-led effort to combat destructive blazes. Working with local farmers, Tanshi’s team designed colour-coded alert systems to guide safe bush burning and formed a group called Forest Guardians to supervise burning and provide a swift response in case of outbreaks. The incidence of wildfires within the forest area has plummeted over the past five years, Tanshi said.
Smacon’s work is evidence-based and focuses on strengthening in-country conservation capacity in Africa. The organisation is also part of the Curtus Conservation Network, a range-wide initiative that brings together in-country experts to protect the short-tailed roundleaf bat across its entire distribution.
International Recognition
In April this year, Tanshi became one of only six women globally to receive the Goldman Environmental Prize, awarded for her leadership in community-driven wildfire prevention and bat conservation. She has also received the Whitley Award (2021) for her work saving the short-tailed roundleaf bat from extinction, the Future for Nature Award (2020), the Pritzker Emerging Environmental Genius Award, and the Henry Arnhold Fellowship (2025). She is a National Geographic Explorer and a postdoctoral fellow at the Washington Research Foundation.
A decade after her pivotal discovery, Tanshi remains captivated by the hidden diversity of Nigeria’s rainforests. The short-tailed roundleaf bat, she said, is “something that we thought was extinct — in this beautiful place that nobody goes to”.
