Gardening with bats?

[Rosalind]

We put up a bat box a couple years ago, and some bats moved in. Previous bats had been of the little brown variety, not much bigger than a mouse, but last night I counted two new large brown bats flying out with what appeared to be four pups! Seemed like the pups were following the moms and learning how to hunt moths and mosquitoes.

Bats eat cucumber beetles and other pests, and of course lotsa mosquitoes, so I am extremely happy about this development. Also to know that although other bat colonies are getting that white fungus disease, ours are apparently healthy.

Anyone else have bat boxes? How are your bats surviving the white nose disease?

 

[Greenthumb18]

I wish there were bats around my garden, there's plenty of insects and mosquitoes around.
Bats can eat a lot of insects in one night so i say a bat house would be a great idea. I've seen bats down south on my property there, its so cool to watch them hover around just as the sun sets. I'm going to put some bat houses there when i move one day.

 

[patandchickens]

My barn is my bat box Usually we have bajillions of bats, but I am thinking that they may have mostly succumbed to white nose disease as the ONLY bat I have seen all year is the one that got into the house a couple weeks ago. (Figures). Truly, it is weird how we are just not seeing bats at all in the evening.

I hope they will come back next year.

Congrats on your inhabited bat box - you are lucky, most people I have talked with do not seem to actually get much of anything in theirs.

Pat

 

[injunjoe]

Glad to hear your bat box is working out so good for you.
I have been wanting one for a while.
So I guess that is my next project.
I found this site with free plans.
http://free.woodworking-plans.org/bat-house-plans.html

I need to do some research on the bats.

 

[davaroo]

When you said 'gardening with bats,' I thought maybe your shovel had broken. Now I see what you meant...

 

[Rosalind]

you are lucky, most people I have talked with do not seem to actually get much of anything in theirs.

Pat

We didn't get any the first year we put it up. It was early spring of the second year that a couple little brown bats moved in, and then the only reason I knew they were there was from the little poop spots on the ground and the occasional evening dive-bombing (box is next to the swimming pool). This year is the first year we saw any large brown bats at all, it was a pleasant surprise. I know we also have a colony of little bats in the barn and a few in the attic via a loose piece of siding. I think the barn bats might have moved out last year when a visiting owl overwintered there, though.

 

[DrakeMaiden]

Thanks for reminding me of another project that is on the back burner.

But that is really cool that your bat house is working! Are you going to build more?

 

[Rosalind]

Most definitely! Actually I think DH would prefer to buy more. The local Mill Stores has them for only $15.

 

[DrakeMaiden]

Sounds like a good price. I'd buy one if I could get one at that price.

 

[Greensage45]

Wow,

What I wouldn't give to have such a charming thing living in my garden.

I imagine that since your winters are too harsh for bats to survive that they migrate to your area for the summer and then once winter comes they move south. This would explain why they live in such small family groups there.

Here in the desert southwest the bats form incredible colonies which fly outwards to 250 miles in a single night only to find their way back to the colony; mostly in rocky crevices and deep caves. They habitat year round in the same place although there are the migrating species, but they would never stick around a local garden to form a family since they are on their way to the abundance in the north to northeast.

I am in my mid-forties, and growing up in this region, along the corridors of migrating animals. I have noticed the populations of bats diminishing. Some summers I just do not see a one, yet our insect populations are booming. I suspect that herbicide to pesticide on the Food Chain is to blame. I am so careful with my pesticide usage and I refuse to use any herbicides.

I admire all the animals of the garden. I am so happy to report that I currently have a large selection of lizards here, but also some old toads that have been here for as long as I have, and tonight I can report that my 'baby' snake (gopher) is now a whopping 5ft long. Tonight he was in my storage room where my chicken and rabbit feed is kept!

Wow, I guess I really got into the idea of bats in the Garden. This is too cool.

Is there any way you can take pictures as they leave the box? A fast shutter speed should capture the wings and everything. That would be awesome. How close can you get without spooking them?

Thank you for sharing your Bat Family. I would love to see the box.

Ron