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Hundreds of bats sleep in the water tower in Woodville during the day. They come out at night and are a real problem to the Woodville citizens.

A host of bats call Woodville home

Cain Madden

Published Sunday, June 28, 2009

WOODVILLE — If you dare to visit the old Woodville water tower at dusk you can witness hundreds of bats swooping down and out, screeching like a scene from an old vampire movie.

Woodville’s buildings have had bat invaders for as long as anyone can remember. According to Susan Murray, conservation geneticist at the Mississippi Natural Science Museum, the bats likely choose Woodville because there are not enough tall trees near the areas where the insects are.

“Attics provide a suitable habitat for maternity colonies, so in the spring and summer they look for a roof that maintains good heat,” Murray said. “The newborn bats, which are called pups, cannot regulate their temperature, so it helps to conserve energy if they are in a warm environment.”

There are about 15 species of bats in Mississippi, of which four species are likely to nest in attics.

“As long as people do not try to touch the bats, they will not be harmed,” Murray said. “Bats do not go after people, and they are not like raccoons or dogs with rabies. Bats just get sick and die.”

There are a few problems with having them in your home, though.

“The worst thing they could do is get in an area where I’m storing things,” Woodville resident Holmes Sturgeon said. “Their droppings can cause damage and attract other pests that might get into things. They can also wear down the wood, which may eventually need to be replaced.”

Of course, they also scare children.

“My daughter, who lives upstairs, will sometimes have trouble sleeping at night because she says that she can hear them going ‘eep, eep, eep’ upstairs,” Woodville resident Amy Ryan said. “And it creeps them out to see them swooping down from the roof at sunset.”

However, the benefits may be worth these problems.

“The best thing about them is that they eat the mosquitoes and other pests, so we have a clean yard and garden,” Sturgeon said. “Also, if you can stand the smell, you can sit on the porch in the evenings and not have to worry about bug bites.”

St. Paul Episcopal Church has found alternative ways to clean the air.

“Someone professional has to come in and clean it up,” said Linda Senko, former board member of the church. “If the droppings are gone, they won’t know to come back. The men had to go in with suits and it took them days to neutralize the situation.

“Bat excluders are also helpful, but until we hired the cleaners they would always find new ways to get in.”

Bat excluders, which looks like a plastic water drain, provide a way for the bats to get out, but not in.

If they still come back, it is best to just view it with a sense of humor.

“It is a joke in town that the stragglers from my business infested the St. Joseph’s Catholic Church,” said Jerry Foster, owner of Foster Insurance Agency.

“And then they went to the Episcopal Church and then God knows whose house they went into now,” Ryan said with a laugh, “Maybe my house, as I’ve only had them a year.”