Bat House Forum

[IowaNate]

 A co-worker of mine has had two bat houses hung for about 10 years now and they have never been occupied. He wanted my "expert" advice on them.

 First I asked how they were hung. He has them both mounted 16 feet up on the side of his house, and within 1/8 mile of the river, and they have two chambers... which is great, but that's where the positives ended. He and the builder of the bat houses were misinformed and using outdated designs.

  The houses were unpainted and hung on the North side of his home, they were built of green-treated wood, no caulking used, had 1-1/4" crevices, and the interior dimensions were 8" wide and 18" tall, the partitions had heavy duty 1/2" plastic netting that wasn't wrapped around the bottom of each partition so it stuck out and created sharp edges at the bottom of each chamber. The houses had numerous 1/16" gaps in the sides that allowed way to much air and light into the chambers as well. I informed him that even if they were hung properly and painted that they had very little chance of being occupied.

  I was as nice as I could be in explaining what was wrong with the houses and that both he and the builder had good intentions, but he insisted that these houses were high quality and I was just being mean since they weren't made by me. He has a reputation for always being right and very stubborn.

  Long story short, he wants one of my three chamber economy houses...but I feel that he will mount it improperly even with my advice and then try to give me (and my houses) a bad name by saying it never got occupied.

  What should I do?!!

  

 

[Terry Lobdell]

Nate, I make copies of BCI's handouts, "criteria for successful bat houses" and "frequently asked questions" to give to people. I also have my own "Ten rules for successful bat houses in NWPA" You could probably make up your own "Ten rules" for Iowa.

But probably the most effective thing you could do would be to take him to the nature center and let him see first hand how successful your design mounting method is.

There are a lot of old outdated bat house plans floating around out there that people still try to go by when building bat houses.

A nearby national wildlife refuge had some dated 1986. The plans had crevices an inch and a half thick!

[cloudman75]

Nate,

If you want to take a chance, let him have one provided he follows your written instructions for mounting it. Type some out and include them with the house. Put a disclaimer at the bottom to cover any story he may come up with. Sometimes it's better to miss a sale rather than put up with a chronic complainer 

BTW. where do you buy stainless steel staples? I have been to Lowes, Home Depot and Ace with no luck.

 

 

[Terry Lobdell]

Cloudman, I can always find stainless steel staples at Lowes and Home Depot.....they are right next to the regular ones......

[cloudman75]

Thanks Terry, I'll look again.

To save money,I am going to try Nate's method of roughing the surface with a board and screws. I'm still trying to come up with a rotary scratcher design for my drill since I am lazy by nature. I like to think of myself as saving my energy . The stainless staples and screening I have found are not cheap.

[Dianna]

Hi IowaNate!
I would hang the bat house for him. That way you know it is right and so does he.