Bat House Forum

[snorrie]

Hi, we placed one house on the south side of our garage and it's attracted lots of the bats that were living in our attic so now my husband wants to place 2-3 more in the same place, next to the first one. Is this going to work, or do they need to be farther away from each other or facing different directions? Thanks for the help.

[LarryH]

I have 2 houses mounted side by side, and it seems to work very well. The bats seem to move from one house to the other, depending on the temperature and how crowded they are. I have another smaller house mounted by itself on a different building, and it doesn't get as many houses as the two mounted together but it is used by the mothers with pups.

[Canute]

While I will not pretend to be an expert, I think I can speak with confidence when I say their will be no problem with that at all. My first two bat houses were occupied in five weeks and were placed side-by-side. Pictures on this post first-timer-bats-in-five-weeks-have-questions-t742.html

After getting my first bats I got pretty interested in the little guys and began doing a lot of research. As it turns out placing the bat houses in the manner in which I did may have actually increased the odds of occupancy. Apparently in many species of bats the males and females want to roost near each other but not actually with each other (yes...there's definitely some humor in that!). They will prefer roosting locations which allow for this. Also if you look up bat houses on YouTube or sites like like it you will be able see video of thousands of bats emerging from bat houses that are literally mounted side-by-side and may number 10-12 houses. Clearly if your location has good sun exposure and you are allowing adequate landing and takeoff room under the houses then the more the merrier!

[Canute]

Here this is a video that will answer your question http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vMnZpyodhmA

[snorrie]

Thank you all so much for your timely answers to my question. The video DOES say it all! We've placed two houses side-by-side now and will look forward to watching the little guys (& gals) move in. Wow, to think I used to be afraid of bats as a child. Now I can't get enough of them.