MEXICO: A prehistoric creature dubbed ‘Batman’ that lived 16 million years ago has been discovered in New Zealand.
Palaeontologists found the fossilised remains of a new bat species that is three times as large as an average modern bat and walked on its limbs, a little like the comic book hero.
The fossil was found near Central Otago on New Zealand’s South Island, which was a vast prehistoric body of water known as Lake Manuherikia.
The lake itself was part of a subtropical rainforest when the creature lived in the early Miocene.
The new species, named Mystacina miocenalis, was described in the journal Plos One and is related to another bat, Mystacina tuberculata, which still lives in New Zealand’s old growth forests.
