In Search of Bats: Part II

It's hard to believe, but it has been a MONTH of bridge surveys. I don't know when a month has ever gone by faster.

After a month, the hardest thing about these surveys aren't the day-to-day mechanics of fieldwork, but figuring out what it means, and what sort of questions I should be investigating. I am more efficient in my surveys; I have a system, and I know what I'm looking for. I have volunteer assistants who both help me complete the surveys and keep me from going entirely crazy on my own.

My previous assistants weren't particularly good with pens.

So, what do bridge surveys really look like on the ground, and without romantic notions?

  

 Bridges come in two varieties: too big to survey, or too small. They are hundreds of feet in the air, or six inches from the surface of a gushing stream. They all look about the same from the little colored square on the GPS, so you never really know what to expect until you drive up (or sometimes, hike up) on it. They are also everywhere. You do not even realize how many bridges you drive over in a day, and probably don't care, but I have learned to care.

 I can tell when I'm driving over a bridge because I get this terrible feeling, a disturbance in the force, telling me I just missed a bridge and I've got to fight my way back to it. I am supposed to survey every bridge I encounter (let me say again, EVERY BRIDGE). Any bridge that I miss could potentially be the one to house a whole colony of bats, and I can't bear to skip even the meanest of bridges.

Start swimmin!

Once under the bridge, I have to check every crevice that could possibly house a bat. Some bridges are easy--a blank slab on the bottom, nothing more--but others have a million tiny hiding places. From the few bats I've encountered so far, I have learned the number one rule of bridge searching, Do Not Make Assumptions. Just because the research says a bat won't be in a 1-inch deep crevice 3 feet off the ground, doesn't mean you won't find one there (apparently).

Don't Make Assumptions means that I need to crawl under the nastiest, cobwebbiest bridges you can find, and stick my face directly into spiders that shouldn't exist outside a horror movie.

I've gotten soaking wet, spit cobwebs out by the dozens, rolled around in poop, fallen off precariously piled rocks, and nearly toppled into torrents of water. My volunteers have similar stories. Anyone who says this is not proper field work should go crawl in an irrigation ditch sometime and then decide. However, the bats I have found melted my heart and made me love them all over again, and I'd survey a thousand bridges for the chance to get up close with them as I have (there are adorable pictures, guys).

My workplace is also beautiful. I am unimaginably lucky to be doing this sort of work in the gorgeous Western Montana, a place that I have been taking for granted. I can camp out by beautiful mountain streams with my volunteer partner, wake up and catch the sun rising over our first bridge. I am content out in the woods, taking an evening run or reading around the fire once the work is all done. The field season is flying by, and while it can be occasionally tempting to wish it was over and all the hard decisions were already made, I try to remember to enjoy it too.

Days like these do not come around often. I have the freedom, and the company of a small but good crew, to make the most of it.

Til next time

-Batwoman

In Search of Bats: The Underside of America

Tonight I am back from my first week of bridging--or batting? Anyway, I have a few reflections after some comic misadventures.

Dash across 4 lanes of traffic without dropping 5 things-ready, set, go!!

1. Octopus arms. As in, I need several pairs. It's incredible how juggling binoculars, GPS, camera, data sheet, and potentially a pole-extended recorder can require inhuman juggling abilities. As soon as I figure out how to hold all these things at once, surveys will go much faster.

I think we need a longer pole to reach that bridge, Captain!

2. Pulling myself together. I recheck my forms about a hundred times before moving on to the next bridge--forgetting something could range from a giant inconvenience to impossible to fix. I know this already from the fieldwork I have done before, but when it is solely my own responsibility, it gains new meaning.

Also, I have learned this: don't leave any personal items where people might happen by and find it--your entire family will assume you are dead in a ditch somewhere (this lesson brought to you The Hard Way).

I know I left the truck lying around here somewhere...

3. Soliloquy. I have already started talking to myself. And my truck, Rocinante, as if it were my noble horsey steed. I don't feel any shame about it, but I wonder what I will be like in 3 months' time. Locals are probably going to start rumors about a crazy lady who haunts bridges and has sticks and poop in her hair.

And spiders.

5. Batsssss. After surveying a few dozen bridges, of which most had bat sign (read:poop) I can pretty well expect to find a ton of signs of use, but I have very little expectation when it comes to seeing bats. I will probably pee myself when I actually find a living bat.

THEY WERE HERE JUST HOURS AGO. Yes, this is a picture of poop. I AM NOT SORRY.

6. Interstate bridges are disgusting, and so are people. That's just a fact.

I don't even care if it's true, I still hate humanity.

7. Fear. I am afraid of failure, still. I am less afraid that the project will be physically impossible, but I am afraid of myself being incapable or insufficient.  Of course, I guess nothing is sure in life, on that note. But there are so many people who have supported me in this, I am terrified of failure. Perhaps abject terror will make me work harder. Who knows?

Step into my office...

So there you are--my first thoughts and some second ones. Back to batting tomorrow!

I remain--Batgirl

Urban Wetland

          After studying wildlife for a few seasons, I am still surprised to find that they aren't all just contained by some wilderness somewhere. There are quite a few that live in your own backyard. I routinely see more wildlife walking to class than I typically do on hikes in the wilderness (which I realize has more to do with how habituated they are, but still). 

        Despite having lived at my current place for 9 months, I recently stumbled upon a small wetland near my house for the first time. It is smack in the middle of developed residential neighborhoods, so I was not expecting much from a little duckpond.

      Bancroft Pond is small, but still bigger than I expected. Despite the path running through it, the area is obviously designed for waterfowl rather than people. In the middle of the city, it was surprising and lovely.

Ladiiiies?

      The redwing blackbirds were in an uproar, the males following the females and desperately trying to attract their attention. They obviously gave no craps about humans watching their love affairs. I sat by the pond, amused to watch their antics, when a little family popped out.

Mama eyeballing me despite my stealthy disguise.

I was reminded very much of my time in Alaska. I know it's just a Canada goose, but it is a magical thing anyway. Here in the middle of human residences, a wild little family is also eking out a living.

     On my next visit (in which I failed to bring a camera), a great blue heron peeked out from behind the reeds, and an American Coot swam around pretending it was a duck.

     Fortunately for humans, life is almost unstoppable. There are still a lot of amazing things out there worth protecting.