Looking for Long Ears

Baturday News is a weekly blog written by Rachael, a middle school student and Save Lucy volunteer. Rachael’s interest in bats was sparked by the big brown bats that used the outside of her former home for a winter roost. Her family cheerfully hosted the wild colony for years.

Hi everyone! I hope you all had a good week. I’m still patiently waiting to hear from Ms. Ellen DeGeneres. I’m sure she’ll just love the pictures of little Freda! I hope she likes bats!

A photograph of a northern long eared bat
This Myotis septentrionalis (northern long-ear bat) was discovered using a bluebird box in Leesburg, VA, not too far from the Dulles corridor! Photo by R. Sturges.

I saw an article in The Washington Post newspaper this Monday. I’m sure a lot of you already saw it, but just in case you didn’t, I’ll tell you all about it. It was about a bat study they did in Fairfax County. I had high hopes for this study, but sadly, it was bad news in the end. METRO (a subway system in the DC area) wants to build a new train line. Before they can start building, they need to make sure there aren’t any endangered or threatened animals that will be bothered by the construction. They hired some bat scientists to look for northern long-eared bats. The scientists spent 7 nights looking for the bats. By the end of the week, they had found and released 61 bats, two squirrels and some really big moths. I was really hoping that at least 1 of those 61 bats was a northern long-eared bat, but none of them were. I know that people want the train line to go through, but I want the bats to still be around. I was sad to know that they didn’t find any. It’s really sad that we don’t have any more little brown bats in Fairfax County. I really hope we don’t lose the northern long-eared bats too!

If you want to read the article, you can find it here.

One Reply to “Looking for Long Ears”

TMC

SUPER SAD-SAD-SAD

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