Baby Bats

Please watch in HQ for best resolution and for improved audio, which is important to this video.


Most of you were probably expecting me to upload a poem for my next video, but this one was rather spontaneous in nature so I figured this was as good a time as any.

I live in a wooded area and have brown bats which inhabit the roof vent under the gable of the house. Their presence is greatly appreciated as they help to keep the mosquito population under control. When the babies are old enough to start exploring, they will frequently fall out of the nest and hang around (literally) near the ground calling out and waiting to be rescued by mama, giving an excellent opportunity for observation.

If you turn your volume up, at the beginning of the video, (at about frame marker 0:29), you can hear one of the babies even though the camera is some six to seven feet away. The short, high pitched whistle is the bat (not to be confused by the similar, lower chirping of a cardinal shortly after at 0:44). You can also hear it during some of the close-ups. At other times in the past, babies have emitted a distress call which is so high in pitch that you cannot hear it. Instead, you feel it inside your ear experienced as a pressure change which can be rather painful at close range, within eight to ten feet, and which tends to overpower all other frequencies, muffling your hearing. This sound is initiated by a 'click' which sounds as if it is originating inside your ear, followed by the painful pressure sensation.

Please pardon the camera shake, as the tripod is made for a digital camera, is quite flimsy and thus has no fluid movements. Macro shots only exaggerate the problem. Also pardon the rather mumbled narrative and lack of decent editing. I shot and posted this rather quickly. But, for those of you who have an interest, I thought you might like to see a baby brown bat up close.

Category:

Pets & Animals

Tags:

• bat
• bats
• baby
• brown

[CatpurrRobertaBobbi]

Until you giggled about the ants and you poked the bat I thought you were a good guy. Your tale of putting them in a shoebox was sweet. WHY did you make this into a science lesson? The bats can die from sitting in the sun. Water would have been nice and some shade. Did you ever fix the attic and put in a Bat Box to stop the babies from falling out of the roof?

[harleynanda]

@CatpurrRobertaBobbi

(1/3) Actually, I’d only intended to nudge the bat, but the stick slipped. I didn’t want to touch it and leave my scent on it. And the reason I laughed was because it was as if the ant had ‘goosed’ the bat in the rear. This was a very common occurrence over several brooding seasons. I know the impulse is to take the young in and try to nurture and raise them in true hero fashion, but nature works its own way best with the least interference. I would…

[harleynanda]

(2/3 cont’d) … put the bats higher up on the wall out of harm’s way, and in the shade, until the mothers would retrieve them at dusk. This procedure became the norm several times a week over several brooding seasons. I could only confirm the loss of one or two infants during that time. The heat was no problem for them. The reason our eave was chosen for a brooding colony location in the first place was because of the increased heat in the attic.

[harleynanda]

(3/3 cont’d) …We eventually moved from the house and had a government sanctioned professional perform an extraction as per the new owners’ request (they are a protected species). By the time we sold the house, the recurring colony had grown to a minimum of some 70 or more members. There were days when they were quite literally falling around me and I would have up to seven huddled together on the wall waiting for their mothers. So you see, I’m not a bad guy after all.

[greggmannn]

boring realyht

[harleynanda]

@greggmannn

Yeah. Was mostly of interest just to my friends or anybody who's into bats. It's kind of rare to get closeups of them when they're this young. However, if you're not into bats, not a lot of entertainment value here.

[rintyamaxbauer]

HOLY CRAP U STOLE MY NAME

[harleynanda]

@Kaiman485

Sorry, but I had no luck finding a translator, and I don't speak the language, so I can't understand what you have written.

[Kaiman485]

оказать помощь не могут?

[harleynanda]

@jcmegabyte

Hello JC, my new friend. These little guys are as light as a feather. Sometimes their fall is buffered by extended wings, and sometimes they simply plop onto the concrete, but they are evidently resilient enough that it doesn't hurt them. It surprised me too about the parent carrying them off, but after thinking about how their wings are not aerodynamic, that they stay aloft by sheer muscle power, flapping constantly, I guess they have the strength to carry the light weight.