If any reader wishes to watch extremely intelligent bats, they display regularly in the evening of Laburnum Close and Regency Gardens.
Most are pipistrelles, by far the most common species in the UK, but they are still rare, endangered, and therefore protected.
I recently saw a much larger bat, wingspan in excess of 60cm.
I checked the garage, to which bats have access and cats (their main predators) don’t and there were only the usual sleepy pipistrelles. So this large bat may be a rare visitor from the Continent, and possibly of scientific interest.
While East Anglia is annoyingly infested with flies, which are the main source of nourishment for bats, Lincolnshire isn’t, so we don’t get that many bats.
A bat box is only slightly more complex to construct than a bird box. They sleep upside down, so they need something to hang off - a bit of old coat-hanger is fine for this. They are quite smelly, and cats will detect this and seek them out - after all they are only hamsters with wings, and therefore lunch for a cat. Their box needs to be inaccessible to cats.
They are really intelligent, similar to monkeys.
Richard Shears
By email