Bat House Forum

[BatMan]

I have started building a new 8x12' shed in the back yard. I'm thinking about incorporating some type of bat house into the build. I would like to do a design that would be in the attic of the shed but allow droppings to make it to the outside.  Any ideas or suggestions would be great.

[Terry Lobdell]

Batman, I've thought about similar designs......possibly mounting the bat house on the outside so guano falls to the ground. The attic could be a heat resevoir which would be vented up into the bat house. I would put a screen between the attic and the bat house to let heat in and keep the bats from entering the attic area.

Another possiblity would be to have a shed roof and extend the high side further out. The baffles could be between the rafters in your overhang. Guano would just fall to the ground. Again heat from the attic could rise up the rafter cavities to where the baffles are. Would probably require pretty deep rafters though........

I'm glad you brought this up........I just built a shed a couple years ago........wish I would have thought of this then! 

[IowaNate]

 I like the idea of incorporating a bat house into the shed design, but most sheds tend to be less than ten feet tall. So that poses a problem for most successful bat houses.

  Terry, if I remember correctly you had two posts mounted on the side of your shed which extended much higher than the roof itself, and ran stringers between them to mount the houses on (I really liked that mounting). But this didn't incorporate the shed's thermal mass at all.

  If the shed is at least 15 feet tall at the peak, then I think something can be designed into the structure. Do you have the basic shed design already Batman? I am sure with a few of us working together that we can come up with something as long as we have a basic plan.

            Let's see what we can come up with!

                                                          Nate

[Terry Lobdell]

Nate, that is correct about my mounting board........it is attached to the shed for stabilization but does not benefit from any heat gained by the shed.

You are right also about the need for more heighth...........probably with a steeper pitch on the roof the overhang on the high end could extend up and out further........

[BatMan]

I have created a rudimentary Visio drawing of what my idea is but I can't figure out how to post it, Image Shack won't accept it because it's not the right format.

[Dave Miller]

I helped a friend design a bat house for their shed which from the exterior looked like a cupola, sitting on the roof.  This thread reminds me that I need to see if it was ever occupied.

[Gran]

I have created a rudimentary Visio drawing of what my idea is but I can't figure out how to post it, Image Shack won't accept it because it's not the right format.

Google has a product for free called sketchup.  It has a fairly easy learning curve to make at least simple 3d drawings.  You can also convert the view to a jpg type file to display. 

You can download from here http://sketchup.google.com/