Monday, June 18, 2007

Bats can swim... a little



Add little brown bat rescue to the list of weekend activities. I was sitting on a gravel bank along the Arkansas River just below the Pueblo dam. My wife and a summer intern and I may or may not have been drinking Coors Light. When suddenly, my wife saw a bat pass by doing a pathetic doggy paddle. Our theory was that he swooped too low while hunting and hit the deck. Bats can't take off from the ground, and they certainly can't take off from the water, so this guy was totally up the creek. My wife waded in, scooped him up on her hat, then we walked over to a nearby tree, put the hat next to a limb, and watched the little guy crawl right up.

P.S. Look at this guy's climbing hooks. Watching a bat climb is fairly impressive.

3 comments:

Anonymous said...

That's sick ... Coor's Light?! Why oh why would you do that to your body?

Anonymous said...

i had a bat swimming in my bathtub what do i do now

Anonymous said...

I have a baby bat as a pet and indeed you can train your bat to swim. If you find a bat in your bath full of water take a jug scoop it out the leave it by a tree so it can crawl up or put on some gloves (never handle a bat bare hand) and put it somewhere safe up a tree :) :)