Endangered bats adopted to fundraise for tracking and protection

Thursday, 10 January 2019

Bat recovery project manager Gillian Dennis attaching a transmitter to a bat caught in harp traps on the stream at Brown River Reserve.

Without protection, New Zealand's native long-tailed bat would probably go extinct.

But Forest and Bird conservationists have a problem: they don't know where the critically endangered bats spend their evenings, or whether pest control was working.

The solution - something appropriate for a young Bruce Wayne, adopt-a-bat, a fundraiser to pay for tracking technology to use on the small mammals.

The first proud adoptive parent of a native New Zealand long-tailed bat, via a TradeMe auction, was Wellington radiologist Trevor FitzJohn.

An indigenous long-tailed bat captured at Brown River Reserve with her newly attached transmitter.

* Why David Attenborough won't retire: 'You never tire of the natural world'

* Slow down time and uncover the secret lives of plants**

He won the privilege with a generous bid of $506 on the Forest and Bird fundraiser.

The bat adoption programme started late October and coincided with Halloween.

Bat recovery project manager Gillian Dennis said the overall aim of the bat recovery project was to understand where the bats were roosting so they could be better protected, and whether current pest control methods were effective.

FitzJohn, a proud conservationist and an avid birdwatcher in Britain, said he had always liked bats.

He had named his adopted bat, Iti Peera, or 'little gem'.

'They're rather special and as a kid I liked the story of vampire bats,' he said.

Describing himself as an 'arm chair version of David Attenborough', FitzJohn professed his love for the natural world and expressed his interest in finding out more about the indigenous species.

Dennis, who had studied bats for 13 years and was working on her PhD, said it was not known how many of the long-lived bats lived in the Rai and Pelorus area.

'We've found a few roosting trees, about eight, but they roost right at the crown of the tree so we haven't been able to trap any of them,' Dennis said.

Trevor FitzJohn was the proud adoptive parent of a critically-endangered native long-tailed bat via a Forest and Bird Trademe auction.

Harp traps were used to capture the bats on the wing, away from its roost.

A small patch of fur on their back was shaved off where a radio-transmitter was affixed with glue.

'The bat has to be heavy enough to carry the transmitter and we focus on breeding females as they tend to stay in the communal roost,' Dennis said.

The tiny bats used to be fitted with backpackers, but now a bidegradable glue afixed the radio transmitter to the flying mammals.

The glue naturally degrades and falls off after around a week.

So far, 11 bats had been captured and tracked.

Unfortunately, GPS was not yet small enough to be carried by a bat so the conservationists relied on tracking the bats manually, with radio trackers.

Bat recovery project manager Gillian Dennis with a short-tailed bat recovered from a harp trap.

She said local volunteers were doing their part to help with the bat monitoring.

'Historically, they were all over New Zealand before the trees started being cleared,' Dennis said. 'They were very widespread and abundant.

'There are still populations in large bush areas but if there hasn't been pest control they would have been dwindling.'

Forest and Bird had been leading long-tailed bat protection work in the top of the South Island since 2010.

The bats could often be seen by the Pelorus bridge around dusk, and bat trackers were available from the Pelorus cafe.

The adoption programme was currently closed, however, there was hope that more bats would be available to the public soon.

You can also donate to the bat recovery project at their Givealittle page.