Wednesday, January 6, 2010

Bat Update

Battie neither ate nor drank anything last night, so far as I can tell, but went straight back to its business, which is to hibernate. Only sign of life is if you poke it, it squeaks. So I don't.

Dear Frances, next door, gave me a handful of meal worms. She keeps them all year 'round for the Bluebirds that come to her feeder. I'll put some of those in the cage tonight just in case Battie wakes up hungry.

P.S.) I think I'll name it Dingbat.

2 comments:

margaret said...

I am glad Little Brown (Ding)Bat is hibernating again. What happens to the colony when they find it, are they a protected species?

We had bats roosting (is that the right word?) on our shutters in Italy, it was the weirdest thing to wake up and see them silhouetted against the moonlight.

Anastasia Theodoridis said...

Hi, Margaret,

Yes, roosting is the word. That would be weird to see in the moonlight!

If the colony is found, hopefully an "exclusion" will be done, which is a relatively humane way to rid oneself of the danger. It consists of waiting until the colony departs, around dusk, for its nightly hunt, and then, while they are gone, sealing up wherever they came out of - and all other openings that can be found.

Ideally, this should be done in Autumn, when baby season is finished. (That begins in June, approximately, depending upon species and location.) However, human health may dictate some earlier removal.

We get a lot of bats in rehab that way, from companies that have removed them from people's attics during baby season. The adults fly away at night and are prevented from returning, but the nursing babies stay behind and end up being reared by us. NOT ideal.