INHS Bat Biologist Invites You to Hang with Bats: Five quick videos on how we coexist with bats and help them thrive

Film Date:

October 20, 2023

Speaker:

Bat Biologist, Associate Mammalogist, Illinois Natural History Survey, Prairie Research Institute, University of Illinois

Produced by:

Kathy Andrews Wright and Rick Wright

Edited by:

Sarah Marjanovic

We’re pleased to present a series of five videos featuring Tara Hohoff, Bat Biologist with the Illinois Natural History Survey. In two of these short videos you will learn about research underway to bolster our understanding of the bats of Illinois. The other three are even shorter; one debunks a popular bat myth, another provides landowners with tips for helping bats and the final video will be helpful should you need to know how to safely remove a bat from your home.

Monitoring Illinois Bats Part 1: The Illinois Bat Conservation Program is a U.S. Fish and Wildlife Pittman-Robertson funded project that uses the North American Bat Monitoring Protocol to survey sites throughout Illinois. Watch this video to learn how the surveys are set up and join Hohoff as she examines data collected during the summer of 2022.

Monitoring Illinois Bats Part 2: Mist-netting is one tool researchers use to monitor bats. Learn about the process for setting up a mist net and how bats are examined. Also learn about White-nosed Syndrome and what researchers look for when examining bats collected during a mist-net survey.

A Bat Misconception: Are bats really blind? Hohoff debunks the myth that bats are blind and speculates on how that misconception may have started.

What Can We Do to Help Bats: Watch this video for tips on helping bats in Illinois. Got a bat roost on your property and willing to collect some guano? Watch to see how submitting guano samples can help biologists protect bats.

A Bat in Your House: First, don’t freak out. Watch this video for tips for safely getting bats out of your house.

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Kathy Andrews Wright is retired from the Illinois Department of Natural Resources where she was editor of Outdoor Illinois magazine. She is currently the editor of Outdoor Illinois Journal.