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House-Hunting Bats Less Of A Threat Than Believed
Got bats in your belfry?
Literally, this time of year, yes. The breeding colonies are scattering, its members, including uneducated juveniles, are looking for hibernation spots.
Figuratively, it’s a colloquial question of your sanity, which goes to the heart of the bat problem: Bats are not crazy; they just have bad PR.
They are not blind and they do not suck blood. Nor are they unusually mean, disease-infested or dying for the chance to play with your hair.
“I’ve seen it all; people swinging boards, rackets, nets,” Jeff Voelker, operator of Critter Control in Des Moines, said of his batty house calls. “Get your football pads. Let’s go to town!”
But the big brown bat, one of nine species of bats in Iowa but the most common to get housebound, is just trying to get away. Like any wild creature, they are scared and defending themselves, said Russ Benedict, associate professor of biology at Central College in Pella.
“I’ve never heard of a bat chasing a person,” he said.
They are simply house hunting. A house with only a quarter-size hole is prime real estate to squeeze into for its nice range of temperatures as it travels through walls and crevices.
Bats also aren’t as big a disease threat as advertised. Bats have rabies at no higher rate than any other wild mammal, in the 1 in 500 to 1 in 1,000 range, Benedict said.
They don’t bite unless you try to grab them. If you are bitten, you have 14 days to get a rabies shot, and they don’t hurt as much as you think, said Benedict, who studies Iowa bats.
Voelker suggests calling a trained expert, like himself, so the bat can be captured, tested and released. But if you’re too proud to have a stranger see you in an old hockey mask, wait for the bat to land and calmly grab it with leather gloves or throw a blanket over it before showing it the door. You likely won’t get a good second chance.
An even more civil method is to put away the football pads and relax. “Turn off the lights, open the windows, and go to Dairy Queen,” Benedict says. “When you get back there’s a good chance it will gone.”
Credits: By Mike Kilen - Des Moines Register.com
