On may islands in the Indo-Pacific, bats are the only vertebrate pollinators and seed dispersers. The elimination of these bats would cause seed dispersal and tree reproduction to cease. The seeds of the Iroko tree in Africa, which produces million of dollars of timber, are dispersed by bats. Calsbad once had more than 8 million bats. The Conoy at Eagle Creek Arizona dropped from 30 million to 30 thousand in only 6 years.
Mothers temporarily escape but return to their traditional roost only to be shot on sight.
In Guam, two of its three species of flying foxes are extinct and the other one is endangered due to them being on the local list of delicacies. Other Pacific Islands now harvest flying foxes, without regulation, for export to Guam. Bats are the dominant pollinators on remote Pacific islands. Once the bats are gone, the rest of their forests will go along with the forest wildlife. The giant flying foxes of Java has a six foot wingspan.