Gavin Hageman writes: At 7:15pm – about ten minutes after sunset – on Friday 22 September, fourteen of us, including Maggie’s two enthusiastic and bubbly grandchildren, met at the Woodford Way car park in Witney to look (or rather listen) for bats.
I was pleasantly surprised that so many people had turned up given that the weather had been so bad the previous days and it had turned colder. The weather forecast was much better and we were blessed with little or no wind or rain, but unfortunately it was a bit cold – only 11 deg Celsius, which is a little cold for the flying insects that bats to feed on.
I gave a short introduction to bats and bat-detecting, and also played some bat-call recordings from my phone as examples of what to listen for when using the bat-detectors. The group was divided into groups of two or three, and each group was issued with a bat detector, which had been kindly lent to me by BBOWT.
At about 19.30 we arrived at the wooden bridge over the River Windrush and turned on our bat detectors. Conditions for flying insects were very poor as it was a bit too cold and there were many fewer bats than I would have expected if it had been warmer.
By about 20.15 everyone had detected at least one bat and so we called it a night.
Three different species were heard:
Common Pipistrelle, Soprano Pipistrelle and Daubenton’s bat.
Gavin Hageman 27 September 2023
JC adds: A few days later a group of five visitors sent an email via the website thanking Gavin and saying how much they had enjoyed the bat walk – so many thanks to Gavin for leading it.
WEST OXFORDSHIRE FIELD CLUB 