Mystery Over Bloodsucking Vampire Bat From Brazil Found In Turkish Mans Henhouse

Story By: William McGeeSub-EditorLee Bullen, Agency: Newsflash

Experts are baffled as to how this nightmarish hairy-legged vampire bat from Brazil was found thousands of miles away in a Turkish garden where it was nabbed after feasting on a man’s chickens.

Poultry owner Imadettin Soyleme, whose age was not given, was suspicious after finding four of his chickens dead in the henhouse in his garden in the south-central Turkish city of Tarsus on the night of 1st November.

On closer infection, he spotted the creature responsible still in the henhouse which in the dark he thought was a fox cub.

Newsflash

It was only when he put the animal into a box in the wake of the mysterious deaths last week that he realised what he had was a huge bat.

Soyleme contacted the wildlife authorities, and team of experts arrived at his property to retrieve the animal.

They identified it as a hairy-legged vampire bat, which normally lives in the tropical and subtropical forests of the Americas.

Newsflash

They are now looking into how the bat, which feeds on the blood of birds and domesticated animals, came to be over 10,000 kilometres (6,214 miles) from its natural habitat.

The species can also feed on the blood of humans and can transmit rabies.

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