**6. Conclusions**

Ecotoxicological studies in wildlife species use rats as the reference species for terrestrial wildlife, including bats. With over 1400 bat species, and unique morphological characteristics such as highly vascularized wing membranes composing up to 85% of their body surface and unique physiology such as echolocation [20, 59], species lacking these characteristics (e.g. rats) may not be adequate when assessing effects of pesticide exposure.

Bats natural life history combined with these unique adaptations leads to the increased risk of pesticide exposure. Due to their high risk of exposure, bats can serve as important bioindicators for both pesticide use and ecosystem health [11]. Early detection of zoonotic diseases may be possible by monitoring ecosystem health through bioindicators such as bats [11, 12], because unhealthy ecosystems exert physiological and environmental stressors. These stressors, including pesticides, may lead to a spillover event where a wildlife species immune system becomes suppressed and pathogen shedding becomes possible [9, 10, 91, 92].
