Around 80 people from the local community surrounding Cussen Park Victoria attended a night all about bats. With the assistance of Flying Fox specialist Rodney Van Der Ree we educated the community about the species of bats surrounding the park.
For a small rural Victoria event we had a great turn out of community members interesting in learning more about the local bat population.
Bats caught included
Little Forrest Bat
Gould’s Wattled Bat
Lesser Long-Eared Bat.
It was great to have caught 3 different species to showcase to the community the variety of micro-bats in the area.
For the night across two traps we caught a total of 3 different species of bats. With one Bat even creating a great display of how a Harp Trap works by flying into the line behind Rob while he did a little spiel to the group.
200 people attended RiverConnect’s bats in our neighborhood event. Not only were there members from the Shepparton community many visitors to the region also enjoyed the night.
For the 2nd year, we ran a bat night for Knox City Council. The bat night included a information session at dusk session followed by checking bat traps and audio recorders set up on Blind Creek. The night proved a great success with 40 people attending. We were fortunate to catch 4 bats of 2 species; Little Forest Bat and Lesser Long-eared Bat.
The International Ecoacoustics Congress 2018, was organised by the Australasian Chapter of Ecoacoustics (https://ausecoacoustics.org/). The congress was run over four days (24-27 June) in Brisbane at the Queensland University of Technology and Griffith University.
Whilst on a recent overseas trip to the west coast of United States, I (Rob) was invited to assist Vashon Nature Center (Vashon Island; Seattle) with their annual Bioblitz. The Vashon Nature Center (VNC) is a community focused organisation providing environmental education and facilitating citizen science projects.
The Moonee Valley City Council's bat night was a great success with approximately 50 adults and children attending. Awards were given out to children who dressed in bat costumes. The prizes consisted of a range of children books.
Check out the YouTube video of the night.
