Bats in the Bonnechere Caves - Only in the late fall

When I was a young fellow guiding tours at the caves we were very careful how bats were presented to the public. It was fine to talk about them after we had peoples money in our hands and we had them underground, but to use bats as part of a tourist attractions marketing strategy was risky, or so my employers thought. Having worked with the public as a tour guide for several years I would have to agree with them. But we are in the 21st century and living in the Information Age and we are using every angle we can to generate interest in our special site. It is true that with information technology bad news can travel even quicker than before but it is also true that people have the resources to research facts and come up with accurate opinions on any number of subjects.

During the summer months we rarely see the Small Brown Bat. There are a couple of reasons for this: one reason is that they sleep during the day and the other reason is that they prefer to be in other passageways that people don’t walk through and leave their smells. In September we start to see the return of the bats as they prepare for hibernation. We guarantee our visitors in the summer that if they return after September 15th that they will see bats. Thanksgiving Monday is the last day we are open for the season and on that day last year we counted about 350 bats. We figure that by the time the snow flies there will be about one thousand.

We do not go into the cave in the winter. During the cold winter months the place belongs to the bats.

Chris Hinsperger