Do Bat Boxes Work?

[Champy]

I was thinking of putting up a bat box near our camp, and was wondering if anyone here has had any success using these? So do they really work - or should I avoid attracting them in the first place.....

..btw - no houses around for a half mile + in any direction....but it'd be nice to have some bug control while at camp (on our 34 acres).

 

[schmism]

attracting bats is always a good thing, neighbors or not.

ive put up a couple over the years and to my knowledge never attracted any.

you might have better luck with purple martins if you have an open area. Im working hard to attract and keep some barn swallows, but if you have no structures at the property they wont come. (the swallows)

 

[Skyco]

Had a bat box up for many years until it finally rotted out and fell. Never got any bats in it.

 

[WayneB]

We have an older house and have had bats around for years. Two years ago we put in a bat house and so far we have about half a dozen bats living in it. depending upon the size you could have 50 or more bats living in a single chamber house. Multi chamber houses can easily have more than 200 bats living in it.

We decided to go with a bat house after getting them out of our home. Not a nice thing to have a bat flying around inside the house!

This is a nice site pertaining to Bats!

Welcome to Bat Conservation International

 

[charlz]

I've thought about putting up a bat house. The one thing I noted is make sure whatever is under it is OK to get covered in bat poop.

 

[jinjimbob]

Make sure the bat box is on a south facing wall. They need a source of food and water.

 

[hayden]

If you have bats in the area then the house will fill up. A friend had one and it was great fun watching them pour out when it got dark. I'll echo the warning about bat poop, though. There was quite a pile under the house, and it was poorly located over a garage door. If you don't already have bats in the area, I suspect attracting them will be hit or miss at best.

We just got two houses but haven't put them up yet. Good southern exposure is important. Good bat houses come with instructions on how to locate them etc.

 

[DreaminGreen]

We have one bat house and I think 2 bats, it took about a year for them to move in. We have fun watching them wiz around the yard with an infrared camera- fun to watch. As has been said follow the location instructions it will help.

 

[coachgrd]

you might have better luck with purple martins if you have an open area. Im working hard to attract and keep some barn swallows, but if you have no structures at the property they wont come. (the swallows)

I was looking for a way to rid our place of some bugs and spoke with some folks within a purple martin group where I works summers (State Park) and they informed me that this is a very big misunderstanding...purple martins really have no impact on bugs. They suggested bat boxes. Anyone find otherwise?

 

[tallyho8]

I was looking for a way to rid our place of some bugs and spoke with some folks within a purple martin group where I works summers (State Park) and they informed me that this is a very big misunderstanding...purple martins really have no impact on bugs. They suggested bat boxes. Anyone find otherwise?

It depends on the type of bugs you wish to get rid of. Purple Martins love to eat Mosquito Hawks which eat mosquitos. Getting rid of the mosquito hawks increases your mosquito population.