Did you know that biologists who study bats are known as chiropterologists?
Learn more about what chiropterologists do with the I am a...chiropterologist video from the USGS Ecosystems Mission Area, who researches and monitors bats. We invite you to learn more with the resources below and with the hyperlinks to the right.
Be a chiropterologist: Test your bat-counting skills with this video challenge of bats exiting a cave. Can you count them all? Count closely, they're fast!
Make your own flying bat: Download and print your own bat template to hang in your home or outside on your porch, based on a USGS photo. The back side of the download includes fun bat facts for kids. Cut out the template, trace around it onto a piece of brown or black or cardstock or cardboard, then add string or yarn and hang it to watch it fly. Impress your friends and neighbors with bat facts!
Color a bat: Find a free, downloadable coloring sheet of a Hoary Bat (and other animals) along with newsletters and research handouts from the USGS Western Ecological Research Center's outreach page.
Bats in the West: Learn more about bat ecology, diversity, research methods, and more from USGS Ecologist Gabriel A. Reyes' 2019 video, 'Bats in the West: Discoveries, Questions, and Future Research.'
Bats in the East: Learn about how researchers at the USGS Wetlands and Aquatic Research Center (WARC researchers are organizing Florida bonneted bat echolocation recordings into a database to assess population trends and bat response to management actions here.
Learn more about USGS Bat Research: 2020 USGS North American BAT Program Fact Sheet and 2018 USGS White Nost Syndrome Fact Sheet.
