hey little bat!

This past Friday evening we went on the Waugh Bridge Bat Colony Pontoon Boat Tour on Buffalo Bayou. It departs near the Sabine Promenade then takes you near the Waugh bridge and stays there so that you can see the bats emergence from below. When it's over, the boat takes you back to where you started. As you wait for the bats departure, volunteers give you some information about the colony. A specimen and photos are handed around. These volunteers also record data, like times of emergence and weather conditions. As sunset approaches, more and more bats come out of the crevices underneath the bridge - the expansion joints are the perfect size for Mexican Free-Tailed Bats ( Tadarida brasiliensis ) . At first they just fly around underneath the bridge. Some speculate that they do this as a kind of exercise, as a prelude to their nightly flight. Others speculate that the first bats that come out are scouting out the conditions and any potential threats. They will sometimes create a vor...

Again, these were taken with my point-and-shoot camera set to HI ISO. They're not spectacular, but I was happy to capture at least something without using a flash, which I don't think you should do at a zoo, especially for the nocturnal animals. Anyway, this is a great exhibit. You can really observe a lot of interesting bat behavior. Fruit bats , also known as flying foxes or megabats, have sweet faces and rely on sight and smell, not echolocation for navigation and foraging (the exception being the Egyptian Fruit Bat). Some eat fruit, aiding in seed dispersal; others drink nectar, actually pollinating the plants. Although not all megabats are necessarily large (the smallest is only 2-3 inches), the largest of the flying foxes reaches a wingspan of 6 feet! The bats at the Houston Zoo (shown above) are Straw-Colored Fruit Bats (Eidolon helvum). Houston Zoo Fruit Bat video BCI's Flying Foxes