As I am writing, there are many small bats flying outside the glass window. They are out in the summer time to feed on mosquitoes. How their wings flutter frantically as they tremble nervously in the air. They dive from vertiginous heights and in less than a heartbeat, twist and divert themselves to another direction. It is quite a performance, albeit an eerie one.
Have you ever seen a bat at close distance? I mean “right in your face” kind of close. I used to mistaken them as swallows... wow..so beautiful swaying in the sky, how romantic.... until one day one of them dashed into my house and hung itself upside down near the entrance door. Enveloping itself with its own wings, it looked only as thick as a whiteboard marker. It is possible to miss it easily. Not until when it started to frown and smirk with its face that I realized that this rat has wings !!!!! It was a repulsive sight. I wonder why the ancient Chinese used these ugly mammals as a symbol of prosperity. On the contrary, I only felt bad luck having one of them visited my house.
There are talks about using bats as a ecological way of fighting mosquitoes. With the capability of catching 3000 mosquitoes in a day, it is a cost free and toxic free alternative to commercial chemical insecticide spray. It will be a pleasure to meet the person who did that calculation. Surely it will be a spectacle watching him doing the recordings. Anyway it is suggested to keep 5 or 6 bats near our house in a 60cm x 20 cm wooden box. But, will you do that? Oh sure, maybe there is even a need to bring them for a daily walk?
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