It is similar in appearance to the more common little brown bat, but is distinguished by its feet size, toe hair length, pink lips, and a keel on the calcar.

Stable, low temperatures are required to allow the bats to reduce their metabolic rates and conserve fat reserves.

Reasons for the bat's decline include disturbance of colonies by human beings, pesticide use and loss of summer habitat resulting from the clearing of forest cover.

[4] Indiana bat populations in the northeastern United States are crashing with the rapid spread of white-nose syndrome, the most devastating wildlife disease in recent history.

BCI worked with the Kentucky Department of Fish & Wildlife Resources to establish a reward fund and provided the initial contribution.

The reward quickly grew to $5,000 with support from the Southeastern Bat Diversity Network and Defenders of Wildlife and was widely reported, and the two men were caught following an anonymous tip.

This incident was called a "senseless killing" by James Gale, Special Agent-in-Charge for the USFWS Southeast Region, and resulted in conviction.

BCI thanked members and donors for allowing them to help protect these bats and work toward a time when such killings finally cease.

[14] Other anthropogenic effects have contributed to the loss of Indiana bat populations, including pesticide use, human disturbance of hibernacula, improper application of cave gates, climate change, and agricultural development.

In the forested floodplains, the dominant plants included black walnut (Juglans nigra), silver maple, American elm (Ulmus americana), and eastern cottonwood.

[16][18][19][20][21][22][23][24] In southern Michigan and northern Indiana, which are mainly in the oak-hickory and elm-ash-cottonwood cover types, trees used as roosts include green, white, and black ash (Fraxinus nigra), silver maple, shagbark hickory, and American elm.

[26][27] Indiana bats begin to arrive at hibernacula (caves and mines in which they spend the winter) from their summer roosting sites in late August, with most returning in September.

Miller and others [33] determined the predominant habitat types near areas where Indiana bats were captured in Missouri were forest, crop fields, and grasslands.

Fish and Wildlife Service and include 13 hibernacula distributed across Illinois, Indiana, Kentucky, Missouri, Tennessee, and West Virginia.

[18] Most roost trees in a Kentucky study occurred in canopy gaps in oak, oak-hickory, oak-pine, and oak-poplar community types.

Around hibernacula in autumn, Indiana bats tended to choose roost trees on upper slopes and ridges that were exposed to direct sunlight throughout the day.

Indiana bats foraged under the dense oak-hickory forest canopy along ridges and hillsides in eastern Missouri, but rarely over streams.

[45] Primary roosts used by Indiana bats are typically snags in canopy gaps and forest edges that receive direct sunlight throughout the day.

[18] Alternative roosts are live or dead trees, generally located in the forest interior, that usually receive little or no direct sunlight.

[22] Bats from a maternity colony switched roosts more frequently in summer and autumn than they did in spring in an oak-pine forest in Kentucky.

[16][18] Shagbark hickories make excellent alternate roosts throughout the Indiana bats' range due to their naturally exfoliating bark.

[48] Hibernating bats may also survive low temperatures by sharing body heat within the tight clusters they typically form.

In southern Michigan, Indiana bats primarily ate caddisflies (Trichoptera) and bees, wasps, and ants (Hymenoptera), in addition to the more common prey previously listed.

[44] In the Ozarks of southern Missouri, the bats also primarily ate bees, wasps, ants, moths, and beetles, as well as leafhoppers (Homoptera), although diet did vary throughout the summer.

[50] Other arthropod groups which are consumed by Indiana bats in very limited quantities are lacewings (Neuroptera), spiders (Araneae), stoneflies (Plecoptera), mayflies (Ephemeroptera), mites and ticks (Acari), and lice (Phthiraptera).

For instance, the distance that an individual Indiana bat travels between a day roost and a nightly foraging range can vary.

[43] A male Indiana bat was observed flying in an elliptical pattern among trees at 10 to 33 feet (3.0 to 10.1 m) above the ground under the canopy of dense forests.

[22] During hibernation, predators of Indiana bats may include black rat snakes (Pantherophis obsoletus) [51] and northern raccoons (Procyon lotor).

[47] Skunks (Mephitidae), Virginia opossums (Didelphis virginiana), and feral cats (Felis catus) may pose a similar threat.

[25][47] The impact of natural predators on Indiana bats is minimal compared to the damage to habitat and mortality caused by humans, especially during hibernation.