The Bat-Bag Project

Day 81: When our Park biologist put out a call for volunteers to make 600 bags in which to temporarily hold bats, I conferred with our former campground host and she agreed to provide the materials for 100 bags if I would construct them. Now, 507 bags later, I can say I am officially done with my portion of the project. Those remaining 93 are going to have to come from somewhere else. (The photo shows about a third of the total.)

Why subject the poor bats to being bagged? The biologist will be taking blood samples to test for White-Nose Syndrome, a fungal disease which is devastating bat populations across the country. Although White-Nose exhibits obvious outward symptoms, other diseases manifest in much the same way so that it is impossible to say for sure that a bat is infected just by looking at it, hence the requirement of more elaborate tests. Capturing bats is best done when they are torpid (a state of semi-hibernation), but even when groggy, they respond to intrusion by leaping into flight. The plan is to mist-net them en masse, and then each individual bat will be tucked into a bag and hung up somewhere handy to await testing and subsequent release. The bags cannot be reused without washing between specimens due to risk of cross-contamination, thus the need for so many bags.

What went into the project? Well, here are the final statistics:
156 yards of 36" muslin (100% cotton)
296 yards of grosgrain ribbon for ties
22 250-400 yard spools of thread
125 hours of volunteer labour at the sewing machine

The bags have been washed and are ready for their first use, but I'm thinking that if even the slightest trace of my scent lingers in them, every bat in the Park is going to mark me as a guano target.

Sewing For Science

Day 340: Recently, our Park Wildlife Biologist put out a request for volunteers willing to sew "bat bags" as part of a study project related to White-Nose Syndrome, a fungal disease which is decimating bat populations across the country. White-Nose was detected a mere 30 miles north of the Park boundary earlier this year and may exist within our confines although we are not yet aware of it. This project will involve the capture, testing and subsequent release of bats in specific locations. Obviously, we do not want to risk contaminating healthy bats by exposing them to anything which has come into contact with infected ones, so the holding bags in which they will be placed prior to testing will have to be laundered before being reused. Tara's request was for 600 bags (way out of Natural Resources' meager budget if purchased from a commercial supplier), so our former campground host and I put our heads together and came up with a plan. She would provide as much fabric as I felt I had time to sew over the winter, and I'd do the stitchery.

A 25-yard bolt of 36" muslin is just enough to make 81 bags. Each bag requires two feet of 1/4 or 3/8" grosgrain ribbon to use as a tie, and the bags must be constructed in such a manner that there is no danger of a bat becoming entangled in loose threads. I have completed 21 bags of a projected 243 and have 60 more to make from the first of three bolts. It's taken me 7 hours to get this far (time includes cutting the full bolt of fabric). We'd better get a lot of rainy days!