THE BATS WHO CAME FOR DINNER

This season, thousands of uninvited guests will fly into Austin, Texas and make their home under a bridge downtown. I’m Jim Metzner, and this is the Pulse of the Planet, presented by the American Museum of Natural History.

About 18 years ago, construction on a bridge in Austin created narrow crevasses between slabs of concrete. Well, these niches turned out to be an ideal habitat for migrating Mexican Free-tailed bats. Listen carefully and you can hear them in the background. Well soon, the country’s largest urban bat colony was migrating to the bridge each spring– much to the dismay of many local residents. Merlin Tuttle is the Director and Founder of Bat Conservation International.

“When these bats first began to move in to our bridge, the people of Austin were very frightened and, in fact, the bat arrival made national news headlines claiming that hundreds of thousands of rabid bats were invading and attacking the citizens of Austin. We’ve learned a lot since then. People of Austin now greatly value their bats.”

Part of the reason for the bats’ new found popularity is their seemingly insatiable appetite for insects– specifically, the kinds of pests that prey upon agricultural crops.

“We know from Doppler radar records and recent research that these bats feed very heavily on crop pests near San Antonio and in surrounding areas. In fact we know that this species alone from the hill country eats literally billions of corn ear worm moths, army worm moths, tobacco bud worm moths, many of the most costly pests in America in a single night.”

Pulse of the Planet is presented by the American Museum of Natural History. Additional funding for this series has been provided by the National Science Foundation. I’m Jim Metzner.

THE BATS WHO CAME FOR DINNER

When first introduced, residents of Austin, Texas were less than thrilled about their new night-flying neighbors.
Air Date:04/26/1999
Scientist:
Transcript:

This season, thousands of uninvited guests will fly into Austin, Texas and make their home under a bridge downtown. I'm Jim Metzner, and this is the Pulse of the Planet, presented by the American Museum of Natural History.

About 18 years ago, construction on a bridge in Austin created narrow crevasses between slabs of concrete. Well, these niches turned out to be an ideal habitat for migrating Mexican Free-tailed bats. Listen carefully and you can hear them in the background. Well soon, the country's largest urban bat colony was migrating to the bridge each spring-- much to the dismay of many local residents. Merlin Tuttle is the Director and Founder of Bat Conservation International.

"When these bats first began to move in to our bridge, the people of Austin were very frightened and, in fact, the bat arrival made national news headlines claiming that hundreds of thousands of rabid bats were invading and attacking the citizens of Austin. We've learned a lot since then. People of Austin now greatly value their bats."

Part of the reason for the bats' new found popularity is their seemingly insatiable appetite for insects-- specifically, the kinds of pests that prey upon agricultural crops.

"We know from Doppler radar records and recent research that these bats feed very heavily on crop pests near San Antonio and in surrounding areas. In fact we know that this species alone from the hill country eats literally billions of corn ear worm moths, army worm moths, tobacco bud worm moths, many of the most costly pests in America in a single night."

Pulse of the Planet is presented by the American Museum of Natural History. Additional funding for this series has been provided by the National Science Foundation. I'm Jim Metzner.