WASHINGTON— The Center for Biological Diversity filed a legal petition today asking the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service to protect Javan slit-faced bats under the Endangered Species Act. U.S. consumers are helping to drive the animals toward extinction by buying them for décor.

With their exceptionally long ears and distinctive faces, Javan slit-faced bats (Nycteris javanica) help control pest insect populations throughout their native range in Indonesia. They are being collected and killed in their habitat and sold internationally as décor, particularly in the United States, despite laws in Indonesia prohibiting hunting and export. The species is not bred in captivity, so all the bats are taken from the wild.

“These are rare animals, not Halloween decorations. It would be truly horrifying if Javan slit-faced bats went extinct because Americans want to use them for macabre décor,” said Dianne DuBois, a senior scientist at the Center. “We still have time to stop this trade before we lose the bats forever. Protecting the bats under U.S. law would shut off a major source of demand and give the wild population a chance to recover.”

Javan slit-faced bat populations are declining. The International Union for Conservation of Nature assessed the species as “vulnerable” in 2021, but imports to the United States and other countries have continued. According to the most recent available data, 1,198 Javan slit-faced bats were imported to the United States from 2016-2024 for commercial trade.

Scientists believe they produce just one offspring at a time, as is common with bats. This very low reproductive rate makes it difficult for the wild population to recover from overcollection for the trade.

“We have an obligation to protect these remarkable bats before the décor trend causes even more damage,” said DuBois. “Looking at ads online, it’s very possible that an American consumer wouldn’t know these animals were taken illegally from the wild. That’s why a U.S. ban on imports is so important.”

Scientists have been raising concerns about the potential harms of the bat décor trade for more than a decade, yet the market has persisted. Javan slit-faced bats are readily available for sale online from multiple vendors in the United States.

Researchers have also expressed concerns about the potential for trade in bats to spread disease to healthy bat populations and humans.

Bats are declining globally in the current biodiversity crisis. About one-third of the world’s bat species assessed by IUCN are either threatened with extinction or their vulnerability is unknown because of a lack of data. Nine bat species have gone extinct. It’s estimated that Southeast Asia will lose 23% of its bat species by 2100.

This is the second petition the Center has filed to protect a species in the bat décor trade. In 2024 the Center and Monitor Conservation Research Society filed a legal petition asking the Service to protect painted woolly bats under the Endangered Species Act.