I was up at 2am again last night, and now I’m really tired. The reason is right here:
That’s my mailbox. It’s located under the eaves of my garage roof, and you might have to look closely to see it, but it’s covered with bat poop. I’ve gone out with a garden hose a few times and cleaned it off, but every night, without fail, a swarm of bats emerges from the voluminous (and unused) storage space above my garage, lightens their load with a quick evacuation, and then flits off to diminish the local mosquito population. From the amount of bat crap we see, I think we’ve got an impressively large colony of bats inhabiting our garage.
That’s fine. I like bats. I’m happy to provide a shelter for the local population, and while I’m not thrilled that they’re voiding their bowels over my mailbox, it’s always over the back half, so it doesn’t interfere with human uses of the mailbox.
But then, every once in a while, a bat somehow finds its way into my house, and they don’t like it. Late last night I heard a scratching and scuffling at the blinds in my bedroom, and then…flutter flutter flutter. I turned on the lights, waking up my wife, who looked up and saw this brown beast running laps around the room, going around and around in circles, with me putting on a robe and running to my office to get my butterfly net.
It was very exciting and a bit chaotic for a while. I was sweeping that net around, mostly missing (bats are agile critters), and banging into ceiling light fixture, which eventually broke and fell to the floor with a crash of breaking glass. Eventually I swished the net just right and captured the bat, which I took out the back door and released.
All that disruption meant we were now fully awake and it took a while to get back to sleep, briefly, because the alarm goes off at 5am so Mary can get to work on time.
I raise spiders and house a swarm of bats. Is my dream of becoming the Addams Family coming true?
They’re creepy and nocturnal
With bats and bugs internal
Then blogged on in a journal
The Myers family
I grew up in a very, very old house with an attic we never went into (and which yielded some interesting treasures when we checked it out for the estate sale). So as a kid, there was the occasional ritual of finding a bat in the upper story bedrooms, and all us kids would yell, “Bat! Bat!” until one of the parents would come and capture it. Can’t remember if said capture was lethal or not. Probably was.
We have a cabin in the Sierra foothills. When we bought it years ago it had been vacant for decades and had no windows in the openings. A maternal colony of bats lived up a chimney flue inside the cabin. Lots of bat shit on the floor below the flue…so I recognize bat shit…and I’m not completely crazy.
Every night the bats would swoop out of the flue, take a few spins around the cabin and then out the windows for a night for feasting on mosquitoes and other flying insects. My wife spent many nights in the cabin with the bats coming and going. I spent one night sleeping with the bats, one of them hovering over my bed…so not a lot sleeping actually happened. Eventually she got the windows in place, but left one open so the bats could leave one more time then close them out.
There was a second flue that didn’t have access into the house. That’s where the boys were…at least, she thought that was the male colony.
Interesting phenomenon: In the early summer evenings, mosquitoes would swarm so much you could not be on the porch. Then the bats came swooping through the porch. Soon, the mosquitoes were gone.
Yeah for bats!
Back in June i couldn’t sleep one night because of the heat.
Ended up watching the glow worms and bats from the bedroom window together with the cat. She was mostly interested in the bat’s, I think.
Never had a bat in the house so far, maybe German bats are shyer?
I guess its likely you already know this but just to be sure.
Unfortunately, there might be an issue with handling bats which can spread virii and other diseases. That’s certainly the case here in Oz.
Source : https://www.ausbats.org.au/bat-handling-guidelines.html
Here in Adelaide we have a big Flying Fox population near the Adelaide Botanic Gardens which fly over my borthers house on the way to roosting. They are conveniently diurnal tho. As well as much those we also have many (?) smaller nocturnal species including microbats although I’ve nevr knowing seen any. Apparently the microbats sometimes nest under Acacia pycantha (Golden Wattle) bark.
Dunno if similar things apply for the USoA and your local species but could well be worth finding out if you don’t already know.
You also deeply love your family–another key Addams feature.
StevoR @ #6 — I’m confident that sleeping with bats, much less the bat shit, was not healthy. We had several interesting “discussions” about the risks of sleeping in the cabin with bats. Fortunately no illness came from it.
We know about bat health hazards, so we do not handle them. They don’t get into the house very often, so bat crap isn’t a real problem there. We are not going to use the storage space above the garage (no heat, awkward to get into) so humans and chiroptera are effectively isolated from one another. Usually.
I am more concerned about health hazards to bats. White-nose disease, a fungal infection, is wiping out local bat populations, so if they’re thriving in our house, we’ll leave them be.
Well, do you have a toxic swamp behind the house?
Son found a dead bat on his property last week, and it was not clear how dead it was at the time or the exact extent of his contact (he had a small laceration which was probably from another source). Around here, any dead bat is presumed to be carrying rabies unless a postmortem exam shows otherwise. Public Health sent a vet tech around to examine the brain, but it had been consumed by maggots by the time they got there, so in the absence of a clear negative result, he’s now getting the vaccine series. Which is making him somewhat miserable.
We had bats living in the integral side passage of our house in Sheffield, the walls were stone and not as well finished as the proper outside walls so there were plenty of places for them to roost. When we first moved there I could hear them, as well as see them flying out at dusk. The back entrance to the passage had an over large lintel which provided a pair of wrens with one of their nesting sites – they have at least three or four which they use in rotation to minimise parasites.
Long time lurker and first time poster. I think bats are great, but as noted above they are a primary vector of rabies in the US. Please bat proof the inside of your house. Who knows what those bats are doing at night. This sad story tells about a boy in Canada who was exposed in his sleep. https://www.theguardian.com/world/2026/jul/02/canadian-boy-dies-rabies-bat-on-face.
My folks have a bat house at their lake place in Wisconsin. You can position it in a place that the guano is less of an issue.
Dear PZ, I’m sorry, even though I know they are beneficial insect eaters, I can’t help it, the first phrase that came to mind is ‘bats in his belfry’.
If you wake up near a bat, have the bat tested and/or get the RABIES VACCINE!
MN Health Dept – Rabies
MN Health Dept – Management of Human-Bat Encounters
Instructions for capture at both links.
Hey PZ and all, I worked out an easier way of catching them safely for all.
Get a very soft pillow or a T-shirt or a pair of underpants and just touch them with it as they fly by. Don’t try to hit it or knock it out of the air, just tap or touch it.
It’ll immediately fall down to the floor and act as if dead. I think it must think that, if their sonar was that bad that something touched them, they’d better get out of the air before they run into a mountain.
Have a broom or whisk broom or long-bristled brush there and place the bristles softly over the bat. Then, with the other hand wriggle a dust pan under the bat.
Now take the broom-bat-dustpan sandwich outside and toss the bat up into the air. It’ll immediately take off flying like, well, like a bat out of hell.
This is quick and easy and doesn’t harm the bat and it shouldn’t come into contact with you. I recommend trying it!
Sheesh! They’re not that dangerous.
They are not boojums! The alarmism is alarming.
I once caught one by hand, small one flapping inside.
(Insectivore bat in South Australia)
Another time, more recently, I used oven gloves to extricate one from the mesh covering the fruit.
(Fruit bat in Queensland)
[Re extrication, reason for it, remember they are delicate creatures]
Bats have Chiropteran tendon locking mechanism which means they need to actively ‘release ‘ their hold; thing is, once tangled in a net, they go into a vicious spiral as the desperately release and flap once tangled.
And yes, the little critter tried had to chomp me as the monstrous thing enfolded it and manhandled it.
(No damage done, except to the fruit and our comfort. Clever little buggers use their weight and momentum to push the net in, to access outside fruit. Mangos in this case)