Photo by Jeffdelonge Vantoux-et-Longevelle France

POPULATION DECLINE
Like many animals today, bat populations in Florida are decreasing due to habitat destruction and urban development. Many of their roost sites are being destroyed by people who have negative feelings towards these creatures and are not aware of their gentle behavior or their environmental benefits.

BAT CONDOS
In order to provide these animals with shelter many people are creating backyard ‘bat houses.’ These shelters provide bat populations with roosting habitats. People can build them from scratch or buy them from bat conservation organizations. They are tall at least 10 ft above the ground and resemble bird houses. It can take 2 to 3 years for bats to move into a bat house. Learn how to build your own bat house.

ECHOLOCATION
Since bats hunt for prey at night they need to have some highly developed senses in order to understand their surroundings. By emitting high-pitched sounds from their noses or mouths and listening to the echoes, some bats can locate prey and other nearby objects in complete darkness. This is called echolocation, an ability they share with dolphins and whales.

Once a bat sends out its call, the sound then bounces off objects, landscape and other animals, finally returning to the bat. The amount of time this takes, as well as loudness of the echoes, is interpreted as distance, size, shape and direction. As the animal gets closer to the source of the echo, the amount of time between the call and the echo gets shorter.

Resources for this article have been provided by Wikipedia and the Bat Conservation International