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Erik
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Posted: Wed Jan 24th, 2007 10:02 pm |
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Hello Bat-House Builders,
As almost all of the members of this forum are from the USA or Canada I guess almost all of you have a subscription to Bats from BCI.
In the latest issue there was my article about the first large (nursery-style) bat house in the Netherlands. Maybe you have read it, if not and you don't get Bats from BCI, a summary can be read here: A Dutch Bat House
I have just uploaded two videos about this bat house:
1. Mounting the bat house on the TWM building in Tilburg on March 2, 2004
2. Common Pipistrelle bats emerging from the TWM building in Tilburg
The first movie is speeded up a bit because the mounting took quite a while.
The second movie is from the evening we counted the 235 emerging Common Pipistrelles (Pipistrellus pipstrellus). In the end you can also see bats returning to the roost and you even see some youngsters taking their first (?) flight. They fly away from the wall and return immediate.
More photo's from inside the bat house will follow soon.
Before you watch the video I would like to thank everyone who contributed to the development of the large bat houses. I learned a lot from the Bat House Builders Handbook and the Bat House Researcher!!
Erik Korsten
Tilburg, The Netherlands
P.S. English is not my own language so forgive me if I make mistakes in writing...
Last edited on Wed Jan 24th, 2007 10:16 pm by Erik
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Joe Spencer
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| Joined: | Mon Feb 11th, 2002 |
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Posted: Thu Jan 25th, 2007 02:27 am |
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Fantastic Erik! A great post indeed. ON the contrary your english is as good or better than many natives here! A very informative post Erik and I'll look forward to your future insight as well. For those of you that have Erik's videos come up large in your browser with less quality: click on the Down arrow in the lower right and choose 100 % resolution and you will see it shrunk in higher quality! Thanks again Erik... 
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BatMan
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| Joined: | Wed Jul 28th, 2004 |
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Posted: Thu Jan 25th, 2007 10:05 pm |
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| Very nice Erik, I was going to ask about the landing area but I see they use the wall. Can you explain the design a little bit ie. length, width, chamber widths etc. Last edited on Thu Jan 25th, 2007 10:09 pm by BatMan
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Joe Spencer
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Posted: Thu Jan 25th, 2007 10:54 pm |
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Erik, in addition to Batman's post above, how far is this occupied bat house from the nearest year round water source? 
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Erik
Member
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Posted: Sat Jan 27th, 2007 10:09 am |
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Hi Batman and Joe,
Joe, the most nearby water source is the building itself as it's the main buidling of the Tilburg Water Company (haha  )
But seriously, the most nearby water source is a brook approx. 200 m. from the bat house.
The surroundings have a lot of water resources (within 2 km of the bat house). The area that is protected for extracting drinking water is also a nature reserve with a lot of small ponds.
On the evening we were filming these 235 bats emerging we noticed that almost all of them flew in the same direction and used the branches of big tree as a hop-over to cross a busy road. They flew over a small path in the forest in the direction of a pond that is in a very quiet and sheltered part of the forest. We think that it is the main water source of this colony. Next spring I want to go film the bats by the pond...
Batman, in the following drawings you can find the information about height, width, chambers etc.
The bat house is 100 cm (39,4 inc) high and 180 cm (71 inch) wide. The bat house itself has 3 chambers. By mounting the bat house on spacers on the wall there is a 4th chamber between the bat house and the wall. The third chamber is partly filled with insulation material. Bats can move between the chambers through slots.
The bat house is made from very heavy plywood. The people from the water company who build it on my drawings and suggestions chose for "concrete plywood", that is plywood used for concrete construction. Because this is a very hard and smooth material the chambers are clothed with plastic mesh.
The bat house is mounted approx. 6 meters high on a wall facing the southwest.
I guess the drawings will make the picture complete... Pictures will follow later...
Erik
Last edited on Thu Jul 24th, 2008 09:55 am by Erik
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Joe Spencer
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Posted: Sat Jan 27th, 2007 10:44 pm |
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Nice Erik! Erik, are you using the bottom hatch for additional heat retention for the nursery colony or is it for reducing the amount of light or perhaps both? I like the movement slots. I have noticed that in the latest houses in which I have put them, there seems to be a preference for movement slots among the bats. I started using them a few years ago when I saw bats switching roost chambers but having to expose themselves on the bottom of the bat house.
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Erik
Member
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Posted: Sun Jan 28th, 2007 09:58 am |
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Thanks Joe!  The bottom hatch is there primary for light reduction and also for heat retention. I don't think heat retention is necessary in summer but I hoped to make the bat house also useful for hibernation. These pipistrelle bats normally hibernate in wall cavities, similar to the wall cavities they normally use for summer roosts. I have not observed hibernation bats in this bat house yet. But then the old roost entrance is still available for the bats so they also can hibernate in the wall cavity....
But that is so difficult to investigate.
The bottom hatch has also a disadvantage; the accumulation of bat droppings on the hatch. Every time (once a month/ 2 months) I open the bat house to check what's going inside there are a lot of bat droppings on the hatch. Keeping it clean is important because the bat droppings are a breeding place for bat parasites! And it's also better for me. A few times I got a rain of droppings on my head when I opened the hatch. Maybe I will remove the hatch sometimes...
Another time I opened the hatch I could see bats (there were roosting in the lower part of the bat house) moving very quickly through the movement slots to get out of reach of my flash light. I guess they also use them for moving through and from the wall which is the landing pad of this bat house.
Erik
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Erik
Member
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Posted: Sun Apr 15th, 2007 12:28 pm |
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Just a small update: Last Friday (April 13th) I checked the Bat House for the first time this year. Normally that is quite early in the year but this weekend it is unusually hot for the time of the year (above 25 degrees Celsius = above 77 F). In winter the bat house was empty but this Friday 118 Pipistrelle bats were emerging from the bat house and 5 emerged from a ventilation loft in the brick wall of the building.
Last year it took until early June before this number of bat had gathered in the bat house.
We are back in business!
Erik
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Joe Spencer
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Posted: Mon Apr 16th, 2007 12:16 am |
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Indeed early Erik. Fantastic. We have been in experiencing the second coldest early spring in New England history and today it snowed again before switching to cold rain. I'll have to be patient but I'm happy for you. Thanks for the update.
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Erik
Member
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Posted: Sun Apr 29th, 2007 09:56 pm |
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And another update:
This evenening I checked out the bat house again:
157 pipistrelle bats emerged from the bat house, 5 from the building where they used to roost.
Erik
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Joe Spencer
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Posted: Tue May 1st, 2007 02:58 pm |
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| Based on your feedback it seems these bats are favoring the bat house over their former building/roost for their seasonal roost. That is fantastic news Erik and thank you for the update.
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