Cute Animals That Are Not Dogs Or Cats!

[Catch-up]

The monkeys creep me out a little, but cute animals after that!

[Ghost]

[Catch-up]

We went to a bat show at the nature center a couple of weekends ago. I thought these guys were really cute!

[Tonyblack]

I love bats, but knowing your feelings about them, I think you were very brave.

[Penfold]

I love them too but they seem to have disappeared around my way over the years.

[Tonyblack]

I love them too but they seem to have disappeared around my way over the years.

A few years ago I went on a Bat Walk in a local park with some experts who had special bat detecting equipment (high frequency radio receivers). I was amazed at how many bats we encountered.

[Catch-up]

I've always liked bats - just not in my house. However, an article I read gave me an irrational fear of the problem (lots of other stress going on at the time). Cancelled my subscription to that magazine right afterwards! It was a "parenting" magazine and most of their articles were that kind of fear mongering. I think if we get another bat in the house I'll hopefully manage a little better now. Probably. I've always really loved the larger bats, which seems backwards considering. Maybe it's because there's no chance of finding one in my house.

[Dotsie]

I teach bat-related infections, and I always tell my students 'if you're bitten by a bat, I don't care where you are, go to the hospital!'. So I understand bat craziness Probably not really in perspective though... I mean, I would give the same advice about alligators... we don't get many of either round here.

[Catch-up]

Without a doubt if you get bitten by a bat or any other wild animal, you have to assume the worst and get rabies shots. It's that 100% fatal thing that tips you over the edge. Before I read that article (and really it was more about the other stress going on - sort of a PTSD reaction to the rabies thing), I just happily shooed them out of the house. Then I read the article and thought they needed to be tested no matter what. So cue a couple of incidents where we're waiting for test results. But I now know it's unnecessary unless you really think someone's been bitten or the bat is behaving strangely. There's still a bit of that PTSD thing, but what can you do?

[Ghost]

I love them too but they seem to have disappeared around my way over the years.

A few years ago I went on a Bat Walk in a local park with some experts who had special bat detecting equipment (high frequency radio receivers). I was amazed at how many bats we encountered.

we get loads of bats mostly pipistrelle's they set off my security light and feed on the insects that gather there .
Plus about 4ish years ago after heavy winds I opened my curtain to what looked like a bunch of leaves it was a bat tangled up in a spider web so I opened the window and freed the poor little sod last I saw it was flapping off into the distance.

[Catch-up]

Glad you were there to help it! The girls want to get a bat house for the back yard. When I found out they can each eat up to 1000 mosquitoes a night, I was sold! My hatred of mosquitoes overrides my fear of bats in the house. And maybe if they have their own house, they'll stay out of ours.

[Mycroft Vimes]

Bats are great!
http://www.batrescue.org/batfacts/batfacts.html
Great fan of Gaia as i am,some of her creations make even me wonder...
So just for this single fact :

A single little brown bat (myotis) can eat up to 1000 mosquitoes in a single hour

they've got my appreciation and complete support too.
(Don't know how,but i completely missed the same fact already being stated in the previous post,maybe it's time for my midlifecrisis in the shape of getting some reading glasses... )
Besides that,i love bananas and cashews and almonds.
Not getting bitten by bats is actually quite easy,just don't (try to) handle them.

A few years ago I went on a Bat Walk in a local park with some experts who had special bat detecting equipment (high frequency radio receivers). I was amazed at how many bats we encountered.

I had a very similar encounter in the park,where i take my last evening walk with the dog only last year.
That there were bats there i already knew after seeing them fly by at dusk a couple of times,but i was amazed at the constant beeping of the detectors and the (conservatively estimated)numbers that were present,according to the two young research students.
The fact they are there at all right in the middle of our small city of Rotterdam is most likely due to there being a cemetery there,which provides them with some peace and quit after dark.

[Del]

I hate bats.

Many many many years ago my best friend was a "bat rescuer" for baby bats who's mothers had been killed. She would adopt them for a few months and teach them to fly yes they had to learn (from the clothes line).. Its alot of work as they need cleaning 4 times a day and they need feeding every three hours, etc. and they stink.

This was well before we learnt that they carried the virus that transmits to horses as the Hendra Virus and then to humans and kills them.

One day she was driving down the freeway to visit me and a very very serious accident happened beside her... it was nasty and she helped the victim who was bleeding badly until the fire and ambulance could get to them and cut them out..

When she arrived at my house she was covered in blood and drenched from the rain and suddenly it hit her and she became very shaky and crying. The baby bat was in a box in her arms. I hurried her into a hot shower and got her fresh clothes and made her tea and put her to bed. THEN she reminded me that the bat (Cricket his name was ) needed bathing and feeding.

But you do what you have to.... ... in the box was the ripped sweater she wore so he could hang off her as she went about her day. So I wore the damned sweater, I bathed the bat, I fed the bat and took her tea in bed with it hanging off my chest all day YUCK! He was a cute little thing.

But I still hate bats... we have a major colony about a mile from us (downwind thank GODS!) and they take off in clouds! When I am walking up from the car from the driveway at night one is usually resting in a tree and it FLAPS OFF two inches about my head in the dark! Scares the s**t out of me everytime! Our bats are really big.

[Penfold]

......I bathed the bat, I fed the bat and took her tea in bed with it hanging off my chest all day YUCK! He was a cute little thing.

Makes a change from koalas, I suppose.



*runs away for safety*

[Del]