So you've knocked back one too many Pimms this weekend. Again. But you're still expected to look presentable/give a speech/meet the in-laws. Vats of water and coffee will do only so much to sober you up, but new research shows that fruit bats could have the answer. When the bats eat fermented fruit they can become thoroughly intoxicated, which on the face of it sounds like great fun - nothing like a slurp of fermented fig or alcoholic date to go with your fruit cocktail.

Unfortunately the boozy bats, like humans, suffer slower reactions,which makes them easy prey for larger animals. A study published in The Journal of Experimental Biology has discovered that fruit bats have a wonderful trick for sobering up rapidly - they have a good scoff on food that contains lots of fructose sugar, which brings down their alcohol levels sharply.

With the Government's new guidelines on alcohol showing that we're drinking far too much, could a batty detox treatment work for us? Actually it does make sense, because alcohol makes us produce too much insulin, sending blood-sugar levels plunging - hence the phenomenon of the late-night munchies. Drinking fruit juice, or a rehydration sachet of sugar, helps us to sober up more quickly and fight off hangovers.

As for other wildlife, alcoholism is rife, from inebriated elephants to merry fish that feed on fermented fruit that drops in the water. Even honeybees succumb to temptation when they drink fermented nectar, but with appalling consequences; they suffer more flying accidents, die younger and often become social outcasts when their mates back at the hive reject them.

Birds, too, suffer intoxication. In a scene of pure Hitchcockian horror, drivers on a California freeway a few years ago reported hundreds of crazed birds flying into their cars in apparently suicidal attacks. The creatures had binged on fermented berries growing along the roadside, and road crews had to rush out to cut the bushes down and finish off the party.

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