Great visit with sustaining supporter Morgan Klug, who trecked all the way from Las Vegas, Nevada to visit the refuge. Morgan brought her sister Audrey (who is a vet tech in Vegas) and Audrey’s delightful four year old daughter Kaylee. Their proud mum Tracey accompanied them and mostly took care of Kaylee while her daughters geeked out on bats! They both donned gloves and hand fed our education bats while we closely supervised. They seemed to really love the opportunity to get up close and personal with Buffy, Star, and Asia. Below Audrey is feeding Asia while Kaylee is snuggling into Tracey’s jacket. Thanks so much for coming y’all and for being such great supporters!
Fawn is a beautiful northern yellow yearling who is ready for release. She came to us late last summer, and we over-wintered her because she simply did not seem ready for release until late fall, when food started to get scarce. Now’s the time to get her weight up and shoot some video to help us remember her. She has been so patient with us, trusting us to do the right thing for her and now is the time to reward that trust.
Studies have shown that the joy engendered by an event is not diminished by accompanying sadness, but that joy is actually increased by such sadness. The resulting poignancy is an extremely powerful emotion and this is what accompanies each and every release of an orphaned bat pup. We worry about them in so many ways; will they find a roost, food, a mate? Will they evade predators long enough to reproduce? Will they realize that not all humans will treat them with kindness? Will they be successful without the benefit of their mothers to show them the way?
But we’re so happy for them to have that second chance! The worst outcome for us is the always present possibility that they will die in our care, without experiencing the wild life they were born to live. We want to make sure the cold weather is behind us and that insects are abundant once again, and then it will be time. We can’t plan such an event, the timing is always a spur of the moment instinctual feeling that she’s ready, the weather is cooperating, the stars are aligned, and the bat gods are smiling upon her.
All the best dear one! You have given us so much joy! Make lots of yellow bat babies! Live a long, happy life!
Our 100th intake of the year is this beautiful southern yellow pup!
We distinguish southerns by their mossy, wooly, olive colored fur.
Northerns are more “Baby Huey” like, with shorter, yellowish fur.
This pup has just started eating whole mealworms.
He’s also stretching his wings and doing pushups.
We had a blast at the Texas Night Sky Festival on Saturday March 18th.
We met so many people and introduced them all to Buffy, Gabe, Freida, and Nikita.
It was so much fun to see all those smiling faces.
Thanks Kyndal Irwin for spending the last day of SXSW with us out in Dripping Springs!
You were so great with all those kids! We’re proud to know you!
Cold front – Snuggle Up! Free-tails don’t have any problem snuggling up to big ol’ yellow bats. Even when pups, we sometimes find single freebies right in the middle of a clump of yellow siblings.
LG, a northern yellow bat, fell from the top of a very tall palm tree when it was cut down. He was severely bruised all over his body and was in such great pain that he could barely lift his head when he was brought to Marsha Price, our amazing, wonderful friend and bat-savant at our Houston branch. Marsha at first thought he had a fracture on his right wing shaft, but after a while she determined that it was just severely bruised. She nursed him back to health slowly but surely over the next few weeks, to the point where he needed the aviary to see if he would be releasable. Now that the mum & pups are gone, we can better tell about LG’s flight skills. Here’s a photo of him cruising the aviary last night and we can see that he has a some damage to a joint in his right wing.
Upon examination, it is obviously inflamed, so we’ll give him Metacam to reduce the swelling and see if he’ll let us check his range of motion in a few days.
He does fly and land quite well, he just doesn’t fly all night like the yellows we released last week. We hope he shows enough improvement to be released before winter, but if not, he’ll be well taken care of while helping with our pest control in the flight cage Winter Garden.
Vibrant young newcomers to the wild Austin nightlife scene, five shining stars took their rightful place in the sky last night. Dianne Odegard does the honors as the last of this year’s yellow pups wings her way off into the night, surveying her new domain and a possible palm tree roost.
It was a normal night in the aviary, watching the bats fly, seeing who looks ready for release and who needs more time. The eastern red pup that was low on the side wall this morning was flying beautifully so he seems to be recovered. The northern yellows were flying with astonishing speed and power and I just managed to get a shot of one of the pups (at bottom of the post).
All of a sudden, the yellows crashed back into their palm fronds, I looked up, saw a shadow, and just got this shot as a Barred Owl flew right over the flight cage with a bluejay in it’s talons!
All the bats took cover so I looked for the owl in a nearby tree and found it staring back at me.
I watched it feed on the bluejay for half an hour before it went on about its business. Just check out this series of photos!
After the shadow of the Barred Owl crossed over the aviary the second time, not a single bat flew for the next few hours!
Here’s the photo of the Yellow taken just before the owl crossed over the cage with the jay. Is it me, or is he shouting “Incoming!”
