LIONS AND TIGERS AND BATS, OH MY!!!
Yesterday evening was hot and humid, so we decided to take a dinghy ride to get away from the confinement of the boat. We had heard about a colony of fruit bats, or flying foxes, at the end of the harbor, and we went to check it out.
At first I didn’t see anything except leaves and branches, but I was looking in the wrong place. Up and to the left a bit, the trees were teeming with bats! Fruit bats don’t live in caves; they hang upside down in the trees all day, looking (as Jessie put it) like hundreds of over ripe bananas. It was amazing to see so many of the world’s only flying mammals all in one tree. A few bats were gliding around, but most of them were still wrapped up in their wings. Then, all at once, most of them took off. They just let go of the branches, unfurled their wings, and off they went! What we were looking for was the mother bats. The babies have to hang on to the mother’s bellies all the time. Think how hard it would be to land! We got some great pictures of bats in trees, bats in the air, and bats with babies, so please check out the latest addition to the media gallery! ~ Molly