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IowaNate
Member
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Posted: Thu Jan 24th, 2008 11:35 pm |
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I would love to see some bat houses that not only meet the requirements of crevice roosting bats, but also look beautiful or are incorporated into a building's design. I have seen some neat houses online that are very intricate and beautiful on the outside, but most are poorly constructed and/or too small to meet bats' needs. I am hoping that some homeowners who are apprehensive about putting up bat houses due to the looks of most successful designs might be more apt to buy or make a bat house that catches the eye and looks great, rather than seeing it as a mundane darkly colored box on a pole or building.
For the time being though, most of my houses will be of the mundane darkly colored boxes...because it works for me! 
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Terry Lobdell
Member
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Posted: Fri Jan 25th, 2008 12:29 am |
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| Nate, I've thought about incorporating Joe's soffit house design on the south side of my home and covering them to match my dark brown siding. I also want to try a gable vent/bat house combo. Definitely 2 of my future projects. I'm hoping in a few years Lowe's and Home Depot will carry simple bat houses that can be mounted on the outside during construction with j-channel already attached to accomodate the siding. Different colors, designs, sizes and mounting options would be great!
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IowaNate
Member
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Posted: Fri Jan 25th, 2008 12:51 am |
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Terry, the idea of a home improvement store supplying kits to incorporate bat houses into homes is a great idea. The marketing would be tricky though due to the fears of many people in this country about bats. But I am sure that a few "green" people would be interested in such a house that helps with insect population without relying on pesticides.
It wouldn't be a lucrative move in terms of making alot of money, but to a narrow spectrum of people it would be greatly beneficial to bats and the environment. Perhaps a few of us can come up with a patent on a design for a bat house incorporated into the building of new homes. There will probably be alot of trial and error though in terms of what works in attracting bats, what looks good to people, keeping bats out of the human dwelling, and keeping guano away from walkways.
Maybe a kit sold to prospective home builders online would be a better idea at first, then see if home improvement stores jump on the bandwagon.
The most important step is to first get the majority of people in this country to understand that bats are great animals, and have people view them the same way they see butterflies, purple martins, bluebirds, and ladybugs...other than the typical and untrue notion that bats are "disease carrying flying rats" which is still prevalent in our society.
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IowaNate
Member
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Posted: Fri Jan 25th, 2008 01:40 am |
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Here is a link to the bat house research archives showing a few designs that were incorporated into the building itself. I would just copy and paste the photos here, but I won't disobey BCI's copyrights.
http://batcon.org/bhresearcher/bv5n2-2.html
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Terry Lobdell
Member
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Posted: Fri Jan 25th, 2008 04:30 am |
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| Yes, I had forgotton about those pictures. Those are all simple but effective ideas.......I remember talking to a lady a few years ago who said her fomer neighborhood somewhere in the midwest had a building code which required a bat house mounted to each residence! I think it might have been in Indiana........
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BatMan
Member
| Joined: | Wed Jul 28th, 2004 |
| Location: | Florida USA |
| Posts: | 129 |
| Status: |
Offline
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Posted: Sat Jan 26th, 2008 03:56 pm |
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http://www.batcon.org/bhresearcher/bv5n2-3.html
This is a cool design, although I'm not sure how the bats enter the vent house, it looks like they have to land on the metal roof to gain entry.
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