Very recently I designed a display panel for the Irish Agricultural Museum to highlight the presence of a colony of Pipistrelle Bats in the west wing of the building. With Halloween just around the corner it seems apt to write a post about bats. If you can tolerate the pungent whiff of bat poo long enough to read the panel at the top of the stairs just before the Country Kitchens exhibition, you will learn that they are fascinating lodgers.
Each year in May they set up home in the eaves of the museum roof to rear their babies. According to the information provided to me for the panel, bats mate in the autumn but give birth to ‘pups’ the following summer. A phenomenon known as delayed implantation.  This time of year the bats will be hibernating in some cold, damp crevice but if you visit the Agricultural Museum during the summer months with the help of an infra red camera and a TV monitor you will spot them hanging from the rafters or moving about. A bit like Big Brother, except with bats…..and tons more interesting!