Bat House Forum

[Steve Ebert]

I have a bat house in the back field. Water is near by and the poles are 15 feet tall...all looks good but I only have an occational small brown visitor. There are quite a bunch of small yellow jacket nests in between the slats of the bat house. Is this a problem?

[Joe Spencer]

Hey steve, yes the nests need to be removed. In very large bat houses there is often enough room for everybody ie bats and wasps etc. but in smaller bat houses you need to get them out and should remove them from any bat house. What size is your bat house? and more importantly do your chamber partition/spaces exceed 3/4" ? if so it invites wasps etc. Never use insecticide obviously, I use a long stick and poke them out or use my hose with jet spray if I am sure no bats are present. Any chance you could photograph with digicam and post? I will give you webspace for photo if you can.

[Steve Ebert]

Thanks... The bat house is a back to back double with 3 slats on each side.. I think one of the spaces is 3/4" but the others are 1"..
Brobably explains the problem.
I'll take it down and modify it this winter.

[Joe Spencer]

On this note Kent Borcherding an experienced bat houser, has noticed that when one puts up smaller poorly designed bat houses with wider crevices they attract wasps and decrease the likelihood of the wasps inhabiting other properly sized creviced bat houses....