Bat out of heaven

On Friday evening a neighbour told me that she has bats roosting in her window shutters. Then, yesterday evening, some of the neighbour's children brought me a bat they had found in a garden. It was having trouble flying, and they were worried a cat would eat it.

There are 30 species of bats in Switzerland. I think this is a little Pipistrelle bat, of which there are four species. To find out which species it is, one needs to hear the sound they produce for echolocation. A special device is needed for this, as the sound is at around 50 kHz - about the upper limit for us to hear. April is the time they come out from hibernation and look for nesting sites, thus the sudden bat invasion. Another neighbour and I are organizing for bat boxes to be placed on tops of the houses - for safe nesting. I look forward to watching them fly in the evenings. Each night a Pipistrelle needs to catch and eat around 2,000 insects, and may fly more than 5 kms to find them!

I put the bat in a box with water, for a safe night.

This morning we went to Lange Erlen Animal Park, which is next to our houses, and gave the bat to one of the keepers for safe keeping.