Bats

[miss_s_b]

They are building a new swimming pool at the bottom of our street. In general I think that this is a good thing, as Mat and Holly and I all like swimming, and I have missed the local pool since it closed. But there is a tiny issue... The local bat colony lives very near to the building site, and I worry that they might be disturbed or upset in some way by the building work, or by the pool once it's built. Hence, I am looking into bat conservation and things to see if there is anything I can do to help.

Apparently one of the easiest and cheapest things to do is build and site a bat box or several. And I need to clean the gutters at some point reasonably soon, so while I am doing that I might as well stick some bat boxes up under the eaves. I can get hold of wood easily enough and I have a masonry bit for my drill, so this should be an hour job, maybe two if I include the gutter cleaning.

Of course, if I had money, I wouldn't be making my own. I'd be buying some of these, the Rolls Royce of bat boxes. Unfortunately, they are £120 each... I wonder if I could persuade the council to put some up on the walls of the new pool once it's built?

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Comments

[rhythmaning]

Has anyone suggested you ask your MP to buy a bathouse, and then he can put it on expenses...

Whilst you're up there erecting a shelter for the bats, you could put up something for the birds, too; that way, robin would have somewhere to call home, too...

Actually - and in all seriousness - I think it is very good you are doing this, and I'm glad you're getting a local swimming pool back, too.

[bagfish]

Helloo - I happen to work in conservation and know a little bit about bats and planning and building work. What concerns me about your post is that there is no bat mitigation built into the development. National Planning Policy and various UK and EU laws protect bats at the highest level and any planning application that is likely to affect a bat roost should have a bat licence from Natural England.

If the bat colony is going to be destroyed, it's actually a criminal offence unless the developer has a licence. The planning authority who gave permission for the pool should have asked the developer to get a survey carried out to check for bats and the bats should have been taken into consideration with mitigation for any loss of habitat. It may be worth phoning the local planners or checking the permission online to see whether there were any conditions pertaining to bat mitigation.

If you are concerned, I recommend getting in touch with your local bat group. It's definitely worth raising your concerns with someone about the potential disturbance of the bat roost as there may be law breaking going on and it should be brought to their attention. You could also phone the bat conservation trust who have a 24 hour National Helpline for people concerned about harm to bats http://www.bats.org.uk/pages/help.html

The bat groups round here are always mad keen on getting local people involved in bat conservation, and I know the Cumbria groups recently got funding to put up bat boxes on private houses. If your local group is very pro-active, they may be able to get you some funding to get one on your house.

[addyit.livejournal.com]

i say go with it and go for it! they deserve their own, quiet home. make your own and see if the council will do something. bats are SO helpful! they eat up insects like mad!

we have bats here, though i've NO idea where they live... in the trees? on a summer night, at dusk, when the bugs are out, you can SEE them, flittering around, chasing down their dinner. on the upstairs deck, they even fly RIGHT past your face!

I'm Crust of The Gouch

[(Anonymous)]

I made and put bat boxes up in the garden, I also painted a little "batman" sign on it too. I'm not sure if they just took offence to the decoration, but they didn't move in, ironically the robin took a liking to it instead.

BTW - Thank you for the mention on your Lib Dem blog awards post, for some unknown reason I can't post a reply using by blogger account, I thought it might be temporary but I still can't.

[pmoodie.livejournal.com]

I hope the building of the pool won't be too much of a disruption for the bats, but making bat-boxes is a very worthwhile activity anyway. Good for you!

You could also make little swimsuits for them, and then they'll be able to take advantage of the pool too! :)