Bat House Forum

[Terry Lobdell]

 



Here is a picture of some big brown bats in a bat house as part of an exclusion project.

The house was mounted temporarily by a relative at an angle under the eaves just to provide a roost for the bats. It faces east.

I later re-mounted it vertically so guano would not accumulate.

I counted approx. 50 big browns exit this house in 2007.

[Terry Lobdell]

This is the bat house after I remounted it vertically. This picture was taken in early May of 2008.

[Terry Lobdell]

In this photo there are several big browns in the outer 2 crevices. These baffles are just wood lathe which seems to work fine unless the bats are crowded. The back baffle surface is black plastic mesh.

[IowaNate]

 These photos definately paint a better picture of the placement and hieght of the houses. Awesome success even with the houses being so low. Terry, could a chimney mounted house be in order soon?

[Terry Lobdell]

Nate, I probably would if it were my home, but I don't think my Uncle wants one there.......Next year I am going to mount a larger one on a pole a short distance out in the yard and see if I can get them to roost in it.........I will use all pet mesh baffle surfaces since I had trouble with fallen pups (5 that I know of so far). Although I have had a lot of success with saw kerfed baffles, I can now see why most of my maternity colonies use houses with mesh baffles especially early when pups are small.

How are things going for you with the flood situation out there?

[IowaNate]

 Things look like a warzone downtown, but for the most part everything is going as good as it can and the river is finally back in it's banks. The Nature Center houses are doing great, and I didn't see any fallen or dead pups as of last Friday.

  I am still trying to have as much success with big brown nursery colonies as you have had, and I hope that the house mounted directly on the building at the Nature Center might entice them in the next year. If big browns do establish a nursery colony in any of my houses with more than a 6 mothers, you can rest assured I will be looking to you for some pointers on increased success.

[Terry Lobdell]

I did an exit count here tonight..........49 adult big browns and a little more than half came out of the chimney cap.......

A lot of the ones that exited out of the box came within a foot of the ground. However, it does go down hill so maybe that was why they exited so low. The bottom of the box is 9 feet of the ground.

I shined the light up into the box after the moms had left and there were between 20 and 30 pups crawling around just starting to get fur........they looked good..........no more fallen pups here in the last 3 days so I hope it stays that way.......

[Joe Spencer]

Appreciate the qualitative photos Terry.  Glad to hear things are finally improving Nate.  I'm wondering if excessive rain and flooding helps or temporarily hinder insect populations.