We had some bat houses that were deteriorating and in need of replacement. These bat houses had small chambers, were designed to attract Brazilian free-tailed and evening bats, but had never become occupied. A local troop of Boy Scouts had made some replacement boxes for us and we went to take down the old boxes and install the new ones yesterday morning. To our surprise, when double checking one of the boxes with a headlamp, we found a male Florida bonneted bat staring back at us! We have seen bachelor males occupy this type of box before when there were not enough suitable roosts available in the area. The chambers appear to small for them to roost comfortably but they do occasionally use them. The problem was the box he was in was in very bad shape and in danger of falling apart. We called the USFWS lead biologist for the species and came up with a plan. Last night we waited for the bat to fly out of the roost on its own after dusk. Once it left to forage for a while, we were able to take down the old boxes and then replace them with the new boxes. On a quick check this morning, the plan worked! The bat was roosted in the new safe house. We are hoping that this bat will move on to a more suitable roost in the future when he finds one but until then we will make sure he stays safe in this one. #OurEndangeredNeighbor
