Bats

Update 2 May 2022: I’m sad to say that we have yet to have any bat friends come live in our bat house - or at least if they are there, they’ve been very quiet about it. I still hold out hope that they will show up eventually. We’ve had the same lack of success with our mason bee house.

———————————————————————————————————————————

We’re currently assembling a bat house, because why not? Many years ago in Poulsbo, a bat took up residence in my shed. He was a very nice bat, but met his demise in a terrible accident that I could not prevent, as the shed was not a good home for him. Bats, like bees and many other creatures on this shared planet, need our help. This has made for a surprisingly easy weekend project and after I get this one painted and mounted, I might build more.

Some tips:

• I’d seen bat house designs with this strange gap in the outside, as you see in mine. Finally figured out this is for ventilation.

• Many designs call for using a stapled mesh to give the bats something to cling to as they sleep, whereas others call for cutting a narrow gouge across the board so the bats can latch on with their claws. I saw a video in which a compelling argument was made that mesh could come loose and entangle the bats, whereas the claw holds will never fail. As you can see from the landing area, I was convinced that cutting the claw holds is the right approach.

• If you have access to a table saw, cutting the claw holds was incredibly easy as you simply raise the blade slightly out of the table just enough to score the wood. As I understand it, even scoring the wood with a hand saw will produce cuts that are sufficient, IE: the cuts don’t need to be deep or uniform for the bats to use.