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Terry Lobdell
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Posted: Thu Mar 1st, 2007 03:45 am |
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Joe Spencer
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| Joined: | Mon Feb 11th, 2002 |
| Location: | Massachusetts USA |
| Posts: | 509 |
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Posted: Thu Mar 1st, 2007 08:20 pm |
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Terry, is this one of your bat houses? Bats seem to be favoring the back chamber against the building. I take it no elements can get in this back chamber or can they?....
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Terry Lobdell
Member
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Posted: Thu Mar 1st, 2007 09:51 pm |
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Joe, yes this is a bat house I put up last summer. It is mounted on 1 inch aluminum spacers which are visisble in the photo. The bats favored the back side on days when it was hot & muggy and even some cool days when it was muggy.
My original intention with the vent in the back was just for ease of construction. With the front completely solid no wind or rain can come in.
The spacers serve a dual purpose: 1st, to project the bat house out away from the building so less guano will stick to the siding.
2nd, to provide an extra crevice for the bats to roost.
The top is open but is somewhat protected by the eaves. The open top allows maximum ventilation on very hot days. On cool days they can just roost inside. Because it was mounted above my deck I was able to observe the bats close up and watch them crawl back and forth during the day. The entrance of the house is only 9 feet off the ground.
In August of 2006 I counted 32 big brown bats exit a similar house right next to this one! Some of the bats exited out of the top. These are only single crevice houses approximately 21 inches square!
My big brown maternity colony seemed to prefer these 2 houses in later summer and early fall.
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Joe Spencer
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| Joined: | Mon Feb 11th, 2002 |
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Posted: Fri Mar 2nd, 2007 01:00 am |
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Thanks for the informational elaboration. I have seen so many Big Browns which are quite content with shutters as well and of course cooler environments. Once the young are raised big brown nursery colonies seemingly have a pattern of seeking slightly cooler areas on average.
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Terry Lobdell
Member
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Posted: Sat Mar 3rd, 2007 02:20 pm |
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Terry Lobdell
Member
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Posted: Sat Mar 3rd, 2007 02:28 pm |
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This is another view of the single crevice bat houses with a back vent. The multiple houses in the sun are facing east.
The one on the right with the copper colored spacers is the one I counted 32 big browns exiting from.
The single house on the north side was later moved to the east side and is the one with the big brown bats in the first post.
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Joe Spencer
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| Location: | Massachusetts USA |
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Posted: Mon Mar 5th, 2007 03:23 pm |
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Nice setup there Terry! Thanks for posting. Have the bats shown a preference for any bat house in particular or is it too early for that as of yet.
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Terry Lobdell
Member
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Posted: Tue Mar 6th, 2007 03:14 pm |
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Joe, yes, the east facing bat house on the right with the copper colored spacers is the one that I counted 32 big browns exiting.
All the other ones only received usage from bachelors, both big and little brown.
The bat house on the north side with the aluminum spacers received more usage when I moved it to the east side (I just had it mounted on the north side as a temporary place to store it). It's the one in the first close up photo of the big brown bats.
The big browns seem to really like the crevice in the back allowing them the option of roosting inside or on the back of the bat house. It gives them a lot of temperature and air flow choices for a small bat house.
I am excited about my prospects for this next season.........I want to try your soffet house design and have been reading Kent's insight on air movement carefully!
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Terry Lobdell
Member
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Posted: Sat Mar 31st, 2007 12:46 am |
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| Something I forgot to mention about the back crevice/vent bat houses is that they can exit out of the top. A few of my big browns did this when I was counting them last summer. It gives them a little higher exit point. This would be an advantage in a location where the house mounting height is limited.
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KC5TPA
Member
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Posted: Mon May 7th, 2007 12:17 am |
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| Holey Moley!!!! That is a setup!! Why don't you just make one long one across the top of the carport opening and utilized all that space!!!
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Terry Lobdell
Member
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Posted: Mon May 7th, 2007 04:23 am |
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| Oh I've thought about it.........at present I just mount bat houses there to experiment with different designs. I will have some more pictures of another setup I've built this spring soon. I have 2 posts 8 feet apart with boards in between. I will be able to mount 6 to 8 bat houses total on both sides with back to back access.
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Terry Lobdell
Member
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Posted: Sat May 26th, 2007 01:49 am |
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Today was the most humid we've had this year with a high of about 80 degrees. This bat house had 16 big browns in it today mostly roosting behind the bat house as they are shown in the picture.
My little brown maternity colony has also moved into 2 back to back mounted houses oriented east to west. They are roosting mostly in the west facing house which also has more ventilation.
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