The central Island's largest bat colony has a new population record after growing by about 330 little brown myotis in the past year.
On Saturday, June 7, the most volunteers in the history of the count gathered at the North Oyster Community Centre south of Nanaimo, recording about 2,085 bats leaving the attic and surrounding bat boxes for the first count of the season.
The new number shows a continued steady growth for the species, which has been devastated in other parts of Canada due to white-nose syndrome, a deadly fungal infection that arrived in North America in the early 2000s. The disease has yet to be found on Vancouver Island, and if the season's first count is any indication, the mid-Island colony is thriving.
Ali Loewen, with the Nanaimo and Area Land Trust, told the News Bulletin that with many bat species on the decline, any loss could have impacts on biodiversity.
"It's the largest in the mid Island here," Loewen said, "and bats are pretty important for controlling insect populations."
At 9:16 p.m. the sun set, and by 9:34 p.m. the first bat took flight, swooping outside from the attic spaces, eager to catch a mosquito meal. At first, the bats emerged one at a time or in groups of two or three, but before long a cloud of a dozen flew off at once. Steady clicks came from the electronic counters held by the volunteers.
One of the seasoned counters in attendance, John Bunning, a volunteer with North Oyster and Area Historical Society, said he has never seen quite this many bats. He has been attending since the the historical society, which runs the centre, made the choice to save the bats in 2022. At that time, the centre's bat population was about 900.
"[An expert] came down and put on his hazmat stuff and climbed up in the attic," he recalled, "and he came out of there with this huge grin on his face, and he said, 'In the roof here there are sections, in the rafters – in each section there are probably 50-60 bats. There are nine sections in here. I turned around and there were another nine sections on the other side.'"
Since then, the attic has been refurbished to allow for easy cleaning that takes under 40 minutes. The guano produced by the bats is then sold locally as fertilizer, with the money getting re-invested into the centre.
"The bats are so important, and they're so critical to our agriculture, our ability to live in this place because if the bats go, we couldn't sit outside like this and not be carried off by mosquitoes," Bunning said. "Anything we can do to keep an eye on the population and monitor its health and all the rest of it, it's great."
It wasn't only experienced counters who came out to see the bats last week.
Kathy Doyle, treasurer with the historical society, said more than 20 volunteers showed up, causing the society to run out of clickers that they loan to anyone that doesn't have one of their own.
One of the new faces volunteering was Vancouver Island University student Kobe Bosch.
"I've done bird counts and all that, I love nature, and my friends invited me out," Bosch said. "I'm not sure where they learned about it, but I thought it sounded fun, so I came to check it out."
For Nanaimo resident Barbara Jones, it was a family outing with her daughter, son-in-law and two grandchildren.
"We just heard about the fact there were bats here and I wanted to see them," she said. "I didn't realize the brown bats occupied the [former] school here … It's amazing, so I had to come to be nosy and see what it looked like."
Doyle thanked those who came out and said that anyone interested in volunteering or purchasing guano can e-mail her at exlight@shaw.ca.
The next count is planned for June 20. While anyone is welcome to view the bats or volunteer during counts, the centre discourages people visiting on other nights.
