Thea Louw of Cotati can remember how when her son, Liam, was 5 or 6 years old, he was “all about bats.”
So it was no surprise, when a Northern California nonprofit leader dedicated to bat rescue showed off some of the flying mammals at the Rohnert Park-Cotati Regional Library on Saturday morning, that Liam, now 11, was locked in.
As NorCal Bats founder Corky Quirk walked among a crowd of kids and their guardians in a packed conference room, Liam’s eyes tracked the big brown bat in Quirk’s hands, and he and dozens of other youngsters seated on the floor listened eagerly as she described how to craft and install wooden shelters for bats, known as “bat boxes.”
“I’m totally going to do that,” said Liam, adding that he’d like it to hang right next to his window. He and his younger siblings, Jared and Chloe, had a variety of opinions on bats after Quirk’s presentation, and they agreed the bats they saw were “really cute.”
Liam’s rapt attention was common among children and adults alike during Quirk’s presentation. The Davis resident brought three bat species — big brown, Mexican free-tailed and pallid — that she placed under a camera to magnify the small creatures’ features. She offered up mealworms as treats for good bat behavior and spoke soothingly when they chirped in annoyance, all the while feeding tidbits of knowledge to her audience.
There are more than 1,400 species of bats around the world, including about a dozen here in California, she said. They are the only mammals truly capable of flight, and one species, the Mexican free-tailed, has been clocked flying at higher speeds than cheetahs can run. Bats don’t fly with the flapping motion of birds, Quirk added, likening their airborne action to swimming.
Bats primarily eat insects and can help farmers avoid using harmful chemicals, so they can be helpful to people — but they shouldn’t be touched if found on the ground, Quirk said.
“Bats do not attack us. We’re big, we’re scary,” Quirk said. “But if we pick them up, they can get scared.”
She gestured toward a photo of a little bat with a big gaping maw: “And look, they have teeth!”
Bats can also carry rabies — another good reason not to touch a sick or wounded bat on the ground — and have struggled amid the westward spread of white nose syndrome, a fungal illness that has made its way from New York to California over the past several years. The disease affects hibernating bats and has wiped out millions of bats across the continent, Quirk said, and she urged people to avoid inadvertently bringing the disease into caves where bats like to roost.
“We’ve got to stop spreading this fungus and allow the bats to recoup as best as we can,” she said.
After Quirk’s presentation, as his younger sister mentioned her own small stuffed bat toy, Liam expressed concern for the plight of the bats.
“It’s kind of sad that they’re kind of endangered,” he said.
You can reach Staff Writer Will Schmitt at 707-521-5207 or will.schmitt@pressdemocrat.com. On Twitter @wsreports.
Đăng nhận xét