Would You Want a Bat as a Pet
I have always thought that bats were unlovely creatures and somewhat sinister to boot. It may go back to that night when we woke up and heard something flying around our bedroom. It turned out to be a bat that had clearly lost its way. I opened a window so it could find its way out but it was probably as crazed as I was, and the adventure ended badly.
Getting to Know Some Bats
However, as I have become more entranced by bird watching, I have found myself at Wild Birds Unlimited on Route 17 in New Jersey on several occasions. I was surprised to find that in addition to birdseed, binoculars and guidebooks, they also had material about bats, as well as bat houses. Yes, you can try to induce bats to move to your property. The first question was why anyone would want to do so. However, I did buy two guidebooks about bats trying in the hope that I might be enlightened. The gripping words I found inside were: “a single, little brown bat can eat from 500-1000 mosquitoes in a single hour”. I was won over.
I subsequently found myself at a “Batstock” wildlife program in Ridgefield, New Jersey. Joseph D’Angeli of Wildlife Conservation Center (thebatcave.org) brought several caged fruit bats with him and spent over an hour speaking about the role of bats in ecology, showed slides and took questions. He showed the audience how they eat chunks of ripe fruit presented through the cage on skewers.
Bats are Useful
Fruit bats apparently do not swallow solid food, and after they take the fruit into their mouths, they strain it of the juices and spit out the residue, including any seeds present in the food. Because of this it is clear that they, thereby, act as important agents in seed dispersal. And despite the fact that fruit farmers have not been happy with their presence – assuming that they damage crops – they only feed on fruit that is too ripe to ship. Although other species will disperse seeds also, the bat is willing to cross large denuded areas in search of food – unlike birds, which will avoid doing this because of fear of predation.
Types of Bats
Most bats fall into two separate categories. There are the Old World megabats, which comprise the fruit bats, also known as flying foxes. Despite my earlier characterization of bats as unlovely, the flying foxes are actually quite cute, looking like inquisitive puppies.
Then there are the insectivorous microbats, which have the unusual snouts and over-large ears. Some of the larger microbats will also hunt lizards, other bats, birds and even fish.
Bats also act as pollinators and are especially important in desert areas where they pollinate many of the cacti. Bananas, mangoes and guavas are three of the agriculturally important plants that they also pollinate. The characteristics of bat-attracting flowers include: opening at night, relatively large size, white or pale coloration, high fragrancy, and dilute, copious nectar.
Bats are now under serious population pressure. In addition to the usual man-made problems, they have been suffering since 2007-2008 from a fatal fungal infection caused by Pseudogymnoascus destructans known as White Nose Syndrome, which infects the skin, muzzle and wings. There is some recent indication that bats are developing some immunity to the fungus. However, because most of these bats have only one pup a year and the losses have been in the millions, it will take many, many years to re-establish population levels.
If you, like me, are contemplating a bat house, there are several suggestions about situating them: They should be hung on a tree trunk between 15-18 feet off the ground. They should be facing southeast in order to avail themselves of the heat from the sun. It seems that bats, despite being mammals, have difficulty in regulating temperature and appreciate receiving additional warmth from the sun. Old trees with rotting “snags” normally attract bats but they tend to be removed quickly.
I hope that bats will now receive more respect and will no longer just be relegated to Halloween.
