Bats injured in heatwave return home to Botanic Park
Hundreds of bats that survived this summer’s scorching heat have returned to the city – now work starts to keep them cool with specialised sprinklers.
City
Don't miss out on the headlines from City. Followed categories will be added to My News.
- Holey bat barrier, Batman! These jokers are robbin’ our views
- How to get the most from your Advertiser subscription
Hundreds of rehabilitated bats have returned to Botanic Park after a scorching summer that claimed the lives of half the city’s flying fox population.
About 400 bats that suffered severe heat stress have been released back into the Parklands over the past month.
It comes as the University of Adelaide prepares to spearhead a trial of misting systems – like sprinklers in trees – to make bat habitat cooler and prevent heat-related deaths.
The university’s wildlife and conservation medicine senior lecturer, Wayne Boardman, said the misters would make trees cooler on days when the temperature soared past 40C.
He said bats were often too scared to fly down from trees to get water from in-ground sprinklers.
“What we are thinking about is putting those misters higher up in the tree, 25 to 30m above, so they help reduce the temperature in the area … possibly by about 10C,” Dr Boardman said.
“If a bat’s core temperature gets above 42C then there is a good chance it will die.”
Last summer, about half of the city’s 20,000-strong colony of grey-headed flying foxes died – 20 per cent were adults and the rest were juveniles. Dr Boardman hoped seven misters would be installed by October, subject to securing grant funding.
The project is a partnership between Environment Department, Adelaide City Council, Botanic Gardens SA, Zoos SA, Womadelaide and Fauna Rescue.
Sue Westover, a former Fauna Rescue SA volunteer who will soon create a new rehabilitation service called Bat Rescue SA, cared for about 250 injured bats in an aviary at her Wynn Vale home.
“We had a wonderful group of volunteers that helped look after the bats,” Ms Westover said.
“We had a whole team of just fruit cutters because we would go through about 90kg a day.”
She said she was looking forward to the results of the misting system trial.
“It will not stop the problem but hopefully it will alleviate it.
“We hope it will have a huge impact on the amount of bats coming in for care for the better.”
An Environment Department spokeswoman said the bats were important to the ecosystem as “long-distant pollinators and native seed dispersers” and they had to be protected.
“In the coming weeks, new understory plant layers will be created in a design to provide the flying foxes with an additional place to rest and keep cool on hot days,” she said.
