Every April a group of bats leave their hibernation in the Durham mines and come home to have their young ones in our dining room chimney. They are home agian for this year and we fully expect little ones to begin leaving around the 3rd week in July. We know this because some of the babies as they are learning to fly and leave their chimney come down instead of going up. Along with the little ones come frantic mothers looking for them. It is mayhem in the house as twilight descends and I crawl combat style out the back door and call for my dogs. Some day we will film this fun. Each year we keep count and our highest yet was last year at 14 in 2 weeks. But as much as I don't want them to fly into me, I love them, we don't have any biting insects and I love to see them leave our eves and chimneys. They take to the air as the chimney swifts return to the mill's chimney for the night. The dusky sky is filled with small flying creatures. Sometimes I feel we need some airtraffic control here in little Kintnersville. So with this as my insperation, please enjoy my "By the Light of the Moon" ~ $28.00 ~
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These bats have come for generations to our chimney. We, by law cannot close it to keep them out. If we did we would have to hang a huge bat house on the side of the chimney to provide an alternative. So we have come to look at it as a summer ritual. There is a disease called white nose infecting bats in our area and the colonies have very depleted but the Durham mine bats faired better than other colonies. I believe they used an essential oil to keep down the fungal infection....Yea for natural common sense remedies.
ReplyDeleteWe know of a bat rehab center up here where,if we find stranded babies or hurt adult bats, we would transport them there for recovery. And Rabies is very low in bats, lower than in other mammels. Bats also cannot bite you, their jaws are not strong enough to pierce your skin. Their mouths are only used for scouping up insects, but they can scratch you with their teeth or claws. They always seem so scared when caught in our house, after I get over the ick factor I feel so sorry for them.
Funny story but I must add I HATE bats..
ReplyDeleteGosh Teresa...if they only weren't so dang ugly...came face to face with one long ago when we first moved into our home. It came into the bathroom window and as our house has two levels (1828)the bat was clinging to a doorway (you have to take two steps down to get in the bathroom) - we were eye level with each other --- I have to say it freaked me out! (shivering with memories)...
ReplyDeleteOh the memories! Our last house got bats a lot. We dealt with that for 16 long long years. I have had them land on me in bed and get into my daughter's hair. I know what yyou mean about diving combat style. I was always diving under the diningroom table (like a fox hole). Afraid to say, hubby caught ours with a bad mitton racket. We bought a bunch at a garage sale and kept one in every room. They would show up on all three floors of the house. No place was safe. They would get stuck in the walls and floors and scratch and screech all night long. Horrible! Then we were finally able to re-side the house and had 4 wonderfully peaceful years before we moved. I have even sprained an ankle thanks to a bat. Ewwwwww!!!!!!!!!!!
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