With the presence of Eastern Equine Encephalitis and West Nile Virus here in Massachusetts, we’re hoping to get some tenants in our new bat house next spring. It has a Batman emblem on it, so I couldn’t resist. The bats will eat the mosquitoes, and that’s good, but what about rabid bats?
I saved my future wife Carol from a bat that had flown into her room at the boarding house where she lived. I was there for just that summer, and that was how we met.
She screamed, I ran into her room, saw the bat flying around like crazy, pulled the case off of her pillow, caught the bat in it, and set it free outside. Her hero!
We had squirrels bite through the screen to get to a bag of bird seed I’d stupidly left out on the back porch. As soon as I confronted them with a broom, they sprayed a defensive scent that smelled a lot like skunk! I didn’t know that squirrels can do that.
There is no reason to be afraid of bats with rabies, unless you have very little common sense: don’t touch a sick or injured bat on the ground, and you won’t get bitten. Period.
If a bat is flying around in your house, most likely it is a perfectly healthy bat, trying to find its way back outside. Open up all the doors and windows you can, just like you would do if a bird flew into your home by mistake.
After the bat flies away, try to think about how it might’ve gotten inside, in case you need to close up an entry point into your house. Chimney caps are always a good idea, anyway; if a squirrel gets inside, it will cause a lot more damage than a bat!!! Mr. Squirrel Nutkin got into my brother’s house and just went berserk trying to get out. It literally required a day off from work to clean up the incredible mess!
…By the way, bats either indoors or out will NOT fly down and get tangled in your hair. That’s just an old wives’ tale. Their echolocation guides bats to keep them from slamming into tree trunks, cave walls, and yes, your head as well. Your head does not look anything like the mosquitoes, bugs, or nectar that various species of bats feed upon…At least, none of the people I know have heads shaped like flowers or moths. Unless maybe you’re the scientist in the movie, “The Fly.” Hmmmmmm….”Help me! Hhhhhheelp me!!!”
We naturally have dozens of bats here in Hooterville. It’s rare to get more than one or two skeeter bites around our house in the summer. One night I opened the door leading from the house to the garage and found the inside of the garage abuzz with bats! I slammed the door and Tom went outside to open the garage door to let them out!
I looked up some online information, but the little card that came with the bat house was the most succinct — about 15 feet up, facing south. It’s 16 feet up, but as you know, the lower part of the backyard is, well, lower!
This one is letting me post! Don’t know why the other one didn’t work.
Someone I once worked with explained that the key to getting bat houses occupied is the same as for any real estate: Location, Location, Location. The best location is warm, but not too warm. There’s probably a ton of info about positioning them, somewhere on line.