Here is an interesting article on how to safely remove bats from your house without hurting them.
http://www.batcon.org/home/default.asp
Note - link changed but site is there - check it out.
We always knew you hat bats in your belfry Glenn... ;D
Well, sorry to say but I really look stupid walking around with these two plastic pipes and old cut off silk pantyhose legs sticking out of my ears. :-/
Gosh, I don't even have a belfry :-[
Reminds me of another project. He's going to kill me. No cliffs, no caves. Think I need a bat house.
Or, something for swallows. We have swallows swooping. Don't know where they nest. Prefer the rock cliffs. Maybe over toward the mtns.
Bats are good- they, according to the article eat 1200 mosquitoes per hour. I used to sit in the hot spring in the desert at night and the bats would swoop in for a drink of water -- guess I added just the right flavor to it :o ;D
I wanted to make a bat house also to encourage them. Nice to have them as natural bug killers and they are much more entertaining and educational than TV. ;D
As a child I was afraid of bats. As an educated adult I think they are cool little creatures that need homes so they can eat all the West Nile carrying mosquitos they can.
When I have my own property I plan to build and erect some bat houses. Here's a few links to bat house plans.
http://www.npca.org/wildlife_protection/wildlife_facts/bats/bat_house.asp
http://lancaster.unl.edu/enviro/pest/factsheets/265-95.htm
http://www.batcon.org/bhra/economyhouse.html
New link for http://lancaster.unl.edu/enviro/pest/factsheets/265-95.htm
http://lancaster.unl.edu/pest/bats.shtml
They were fun to watch as they dipped into the warm springs for a quick drink at Saline Valley, while having a good soak and shooting the bull about all sorts of highly intellectual subjects. ::)
holidaying on the continent once I noticed that bats were hanging around the lamp posts catching the insects that were attracted to the light - unfortunately for them a local owl had learned the same thing about the bats! was amazing to watch this thing swoop out of the dark and catch bats in mid flight!
This past weekend, my family was busy helping me put up tar paper on our beach house project. They started working on a section that wasn't completed the previous weekend. All of a sudden I heard my wife scream.
She almost hit a bat with the tacker hammer. The bat was taking shelter in a small pocket of the tar paper that hadn't been completely secured.
At the bottom of the pocket there was even a bit of guano!
I do like the idea of a bat house....
mt
Bats are welcome around here. Great to have someone working on the mosquitoes.