[hinnark]

Hi,

found this bat in my bat box a couple of weeks ago. Sorry for picture quality. Is it possible to identify this species?
Steve

[Rags]

It looks alot like the Big Brown Bat I saw in the states, but it's not a great picture.

Try the Bat Conservation Trust http://www.bats.org.uk/ they may know or may be able to hook you up with a Bat group in Germany...Good Luck.

[batdan]

It looks like a Common pipistrelle (Pipistrellus pipistrellus); very small, black face - small black rubbery ears.

Nice bat ^8^
Daniel

[666taz]

Could it be a noctule bat http://www.bio.bris.ac.uk/research/b...es/noctule.htm

[hinnark]

Originally Posted by 666taz

Could it be a noctule bat http://www.bio.bris.ac.uk/research/b...es/noctule.htm

You couldn't see that because of missing reference points for size comparison but this bat was much smaller than Noctule. Common Pipistrelle would be a better fit, though I'm still not sure if it was really that small. I'll take a look at the bat box again trying to assess its size. Thanks so far to you all!

Steve

[bluechaffinch]

It is definitely a Pipistrelle species, no doubt at all. Assuming the bat box is a Schwegler 1FF (which it very much looks like), the bat is very small. The only way to get a positive ID (without handling it, which you need a licence for) is to record its echolocation.

[hinnark]

Bluechaffinch,

you are correct, this is the Schwegler bat box. It hung at my balconey for years but I never noticed any bat using it until this summer after I moved it only few centimetres towards the sun. What was really amazing is that I could hear some kind of noise when the bat was entering the box at night.

Steve

[skink1978]

Another vote for pipistrelle sp, probably Common as Dan suggests.

[bluechaffinch]

Originally Posted by hinnark

Bluechaffinch,

you are correct, this is the Schwegler bat box. It hung at my balconey for years but I never noticed any bat using it until this summer after I moved it only few centimetres towards the sun. What was really amazing is that I could hear some kind of noise when the bat was entering the box at night.

Steve

Great to have a bat actually using a bat box! The sound you have been hearing is likely to be (unless you have incredibly sharp ears) some kind of social calling which the bat(s) make. This will be at or around the 20khz range and audible to most people. Also, roost chatter is generally very audible even at quite a distance. Given your geogrphical location in west-central Europe, it may one of the other pipistrelle species rather than common.

[Brian Bullough]

You could mark the inside of the box with a simple scale for future reference .
Brian

[hinnark]

Brian, with this box I can use the wooden "rungs" at the back plane roughly as a scale. Remeasured I come to the result of ~ 51 mm body-length.

Bluechaffinch, the noise I've heard did not come from the bat's voice. It was a sound like "whoomp" and was caused mechanically, when the bat flew into the box. It seems that the bat-box, when hanging at the wall works as a resonating body that amplify this "enter-noise". Unfortunately, the next day the bat disappeared :( . I really hope that my opening of the box (only two times for about 10 seconds) wasn't the cause of this.

Steve