The Illinois Bat Conservation Program is officially back into the field season!
Ash and Indiana bat
We started getting out and collecting data in May but we haven’t had a chance to get the blog updated. Our graduate student Ash, and her assistants Brooke and Abby, have been working hard catching bats across the state. At their first study area they caught 27 bats which is a great start! This summer we have added radio tracking to the project, which allows us to track the bats back to their day roosts. So far we have radio-tagged two Indiana bats and are hoping to catch many more by the end of the field season.
In other news, very shortly we will be sending letters to the landowners who allowed us to do acoustic surveys on their properties last summer. The letters will let the landowers know how much bat activity we recorded and the n umber of bat species we were able to distinguish. If we visited your property in 2016 and you do not get a letter by June 23rd, please email us (info@illinoisbats.org) and we can make sure you get the info!