UF Bat House Homepage
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Bad Press for UF Bats: 04/06/2005
The unfortunate story here will give a bad name to UF bats. The unfortunate thing is that if people would be more careful with wild animals who are injured/sick, then this would not have happened. Another thing to note is that rabies in bats most often is the kind that does not make them seek to harm others (it paralyzes them instead). Here is the Fox news story.

WE WON!!! 12-8-98

THE BAT HOUSE AND LAKE ALICE'S WILDLIFE AREA HAS BEEN SAVED! For over a year and one-half, many people were contacting the state Cabinet (Florida) in the attempt to have them force the University of Florida to keep the Lake Alice Wildlife Area and the University of Florida Bat House just the way they are. UF wanted to build a second bat house, to move the bats there, and to turn the Lake Alice area into dorms. The problem is that there is no guarantee that the bats would ever stay at the new location (it took them 4.5 years to move into the current one). The Governor and his Cabinet have told UF to look elsewhere for the location to build the dorms! Congratulations everyone!! We have helped the voices of the bats be heard and have also maintained the Lake Alice area as a wildlife and recreation area! The Alligator Newspaper has an article on this:

ALLIGATOR ONLINE "Chiles, Cabinet decide Bat House will stay put" (12/9/98)

Here are some Alligator articles about UF's old plans to move the bat house and put dorms on Lake Alice:
ALLIGATOR ONLINE Housing complex may pave way for garage (9/25/97)
ALLIGATOR ONLINE Group opposes housing designation (10/1/97)
ALLIGATOR ONLINE Bat shouldn't be left homeless (10/15/97)
ALLIGATOR ONLINE Protesters batty to save winged mammals (10/21/97)
ALLIGATOR ONLINE Construction plans may uproot student gardens (10/24/97)
ALLIGATOR ONLINE State, Chiles to decide fate of UF's Bat House (11/30/98)
ALLIGATOR ONLINE Crowd rallies for UF Bat House as vote nears (12/4/98)

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UF Bat House Info:

[UF Bat House Photo 1]

There are Mexican (Brazilian) free-tailed bats residing in the University of Florida's Bat House near Lake Alice. The bat house was originally built to give an alternative roost to the ~14,000 bats that were residing in the UF Track and Field Stadium... For a long time bats refused to call it home. It remained mostly empty for four years, but then the first batch of permanent residents moved in (Jan. 1995). Now, after over two years' worth of new-borns, the numbers have reached around 60,000! You can view them as they leave to feed every night (just as it begins to become dark out). Check them out!

Here are the long-awaited photos of the UF Bat-House!

[small Bat House
photo 2]
[small Bat House
photo 3]
[small Bat House
photo 4]
[small Bat House
photo 5]

There are two types of bats that reside at UF:

[sm. bat] Mexican/Brazilian Free-Tailed Bat [sm. bat] Southeastern Bat

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[sm.
bat] Directions to the UF Bat House

[sm. bat] <== Check out this excellent article about the UF Bat House
(reproduced with permission)

[sm. bat] <== And, here's a copy of the cool informational handout distributed
at the UF bat house (reproduced with permission)


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Other UF-related pages on bats:

"Bats Give Blood in the Name of Good Health"
ALLIGATOR ONLINE Observatory constructed to protect bat house (11/20/96)

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[sm. bat] You Want Your Own Bat House??

[sm. bat] Or How About a Bat-Detector?

[sm. bat] Tom's Bat-Comics

[sm. bat] See the Bats of the Lowry Park Zoo (Tampa)

[Lubee Foundation] The Lubee Foundation

[bats] The all-encompassing Buzbee's Bat Page

[BCI] Bat Conservation International


For more bat info, feel free to ask me!:
[mailbox]
UF Bat House Homepage / http://www.afn.org/~ufbat / revised 9-24-2006