To what extent tropical forest persisted in the Malay-Thai Peninsula during the Last Glacial Maximum, or contracted southwards with subsequent post-glacial expansion, has long been debated. These competing scenarios might be expected to have left contrasting broad spatial patterns of diversity of forest-dependent taxa. To test for a postglacial northward spread of forest, we examined latitudinal clines of forest-dependent bat species at 15 forest sites across Peninsular Malaysia. From captures of 3776 insectivorous forest bats, we found that low richness characterized the north of the study area: predicted richness of 9-16 species, compared with 21-23 in the south. Predicted species richness decreased significantly with increasing latitude, but showed no relationship with either seasonality or peninsula width. Analyses of beta-diversity showed that differences between communities were not related to geographical distance, although there was evidence of greater differences in species numbers between the most distant sites. Assemblages were consistently dominated by six cave-roosting species from the families Rhinolophidae and Hipposideridae, while another 16 species were consistently rare. We suggest that these observed patterns are consistent with the hypothesized northward expansion of tropical rain forest since the Last Glacial Maximum, but emphasize that more surveys in the extreme north and south of the peninsula are required to support this assertion.

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Rapid urbanisation in Malaysia has led to an increase in anthropogenic activities, inducing degradation of the natural environment. This advocates the necessity of wildlife and resource inventories be conducted at available forested areas, promoting steady improvement in the existing conservation and management plans, especially for threatened taxa such as the small mammals. Small mammals surveys was conducted at Tasik Bera, Ulu Gombak Forest Reserve, Sungkai Wildlife Conservation Centre, Penang Island, and Wang Kelian State Park. Harp traps, mist-nets, cage traps and pitfall traps were set during the surveys. Rhinolophus affinis was the most abundant (N = 61) volant small mammal, followed by Rhinolophus lepidus (N = 27). Meanwhile, the most abundant non-volant small mammal are Leopoldamys sabanus (N = 33), followed by Maxomys rajah (N = 25), and Tupaia glis (N = 22). Two species of shrews, Suncus etruscus and Crocidura monticola were caught as singletons. The results indicated that Ulu Gombak Forest Reserve has the highest species diversity (H’ = 2.754), whereas Penang Island recorded the lowest (H’ = 2.245). The species lists of small mammals generated from the survey will be significant for various stakeholders’ conservation and monitoring plans.   Pembangunan yang semakin pesat di Malaysia telah meningkatkan bilangan aktiviti antropogenik, sekaligus menyebabkan kemerosotan alam sekitar. Ini menunjukkan bahawa perlunya inventori hidupan liar dan sumber alam sekitar dijalankan di dalam kawasan hutan yang sedia ada, untuk mempromosikan peningkatan yang seimbang dalam pelan pemuliharaan dan pengurusan yang sedia ada, terutamanya untuk haiwan yang terancam seperti spesies mamalia kecil. Kajian mamalia kecil telah dijalankan di Tasik Bera, Hutan Simpan Ulu Gombak, Pusat Konservasi Hidupan Liar Sungkai, Pulau Pinang, dan Taman Negeri Wang Kelian. Harp trap, mist net, cage trap dan pitfall trap telah dipasang untuk kajian. Spesies Rhinolophus affinis (N = 61) merupakan spesies yang paling banyak ditangkap, diikuti dengan R. Lepidus (N = 27). Manakala untuk mamalia kecil tidak terbang, species Leopoldamys sabanus merupakan spesies paling banyak (N = 33) diikuti dengan Maxomys rajah (N = 25) dan Tupaia glis (N = 22). Dua spesies cencurut, Suncus etruscus dan Crocidura monticola masing-masing telah ditangkap dengan jumlah satu individu bagi setiap satu spesies. Hutan Simpan Ulu Gombak merekodkan kepelbagaian spesies yang paling tinggi (H’ = 2.754), manakala Pulau Pinang merekodkan nilai yang paling rendah (H’ = 2.245). Senarai mamalia kecil yang telah direkodkan melalui kajian ini merupakan maklumat yang signifikan bagi tujuan pemantauan dan konservasi biodiversiti.

The Southeast Asian species of Hypsugo are rare bats, except for H. cadornae and H. pulveratus, which are distributed throughout the Indomalayan region. Hypsugo macrotis is restricted to Peninsular Malaysia, Sumatra, Java and adjacent islands, and is known only from a handful of specimens. Here we report a new locality record of the species from Seremban, Peninsular Malaysia, which also represents the first known building-dweller colony of any Hypsugo from the region. We discuss the taxonomic status of two morphologically similar species, H. macrotis and H. vordermanni, and provide the first COI and cyt b gene sequences for H. macrotis and reconstruct the species' phylogenetic relationships.