A bat about the size of a 20-cent coin has been found for the first time living in urban areas of the Illawarra’s low-lying grassy woodlands.<\/p>\n
The discovery of Southern Myotis by researchers from the NSW Department of Climate Change, Energy, the Environment and Water (DCCEEW) confirms Wollongong as the threatened species’ most southern home in NSW.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Weighing up to 40 grams, microbats are tiny flying mammals known to favour the variety of vegetation and protection offered by heavily wooded areas.\u00a0<\/p>\n
But senior threatened species officer Beth Mott said microbats suffered from habitat loss due to urban sprawl.\u00a0<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
Eight Southern Myotis were captured during a first-of-its-kind harp trap survey in the Illawarra. (Supplied: DCCEEW)<\/p>\n
“This woodland [the Illawarra Escarpment] is certainly not in the same footprint that it used to exist in,” she said.<\/p>\n
“We’ve lost about 80 per cent of the woodland and there’s about 20 per cent of it left and it stretches from Corrimal all the way down to Bawley Point.<\/p>\n
“So this is super exciting.”\u00a0<\/p>\n
Dr Mott estimates there are 10,000 Southern Myotis living in Australia.<\/p>\n
The breed of microbat is recognised by its disproportionately large hairy feet.\u00a0<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
Beth Mott (left), with Holly Parsons, says she is often cold and wet but full of excitement when conducting night-time microbat surveys. (ABC Illawarra: Sean O’Brien)<\/p>\n
Dr Mott and her team captured eight of the animals during first-of-their-kind night surveys using harp traps near Yallah and South Nowra between February and May.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Dr Mott said she was shocked to find the animals foraging, in some cases, within 100 metres of housing estates rather than relocating away from new developments.\u00a0<\/p>\n
“We would have expected in some ways that some of our vulnerable species of microbats do hang on in the area,” she said.\u00a0<\/p>\n
“But to see them moving into the urban spaces is something really special.”<\/p>\n
The Illawarra Escarpment, which frames Wollongong, is a popular home for many animals and plant species. (ABC Illawarra: Justin Huntsdale)<\/p>\n
Microbats typically seek shelter in caves and hollowed-out trees, according to Dr Mott, but she said road culverts were becoming the species’ next best option.<\/p>\n
“If we start to lose things like large hollowed-out trees, we [could] lose our bat fauna,” she said.<\/p>\n
Although bats are often referred to as noisy, messy creatures who emerge during twilight hours, Dr Mott said they play an important role in the broader ecosystem and need protection.<\/p>\n
“They allow us to have a better time, like not getting eaten by mozzies when you’re out at the barbie,” she said.<\/p>\n
“They’re eating a vast amount of insects every night \u2014 sometimes as much as half their own body per night.”<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
The discovery of Southern Myotis in urban Wollongong was made during a first-of-its-kind harp trap survey. (Supplied: DCCEEW)<\/p>\n
Urban decisions for wildlife<\/p>\n
More than 350 of the mosquito-munching animals were caught during Dr Mott’s harp trap surveys.\u00a0<\/p>\n
The technique uses two or more rows of fishing line, stretched across a frame, with a cotton collection bag.\u00a0<\/p>\n
“We generally check the [traps] every two hours, all throughout the night, measure the bats and then let them go straight away so they can get back home,” Dr Mott said.\u00a0<\/p>\n
“We’re actually still doing acoustic detection work at the moment so we should be able to add to our understanding of microbats very soon.”\u00a0<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
Eleven different species were found during the survey, including long-eared bats. (Supplied: DCCEEW)<\/p>\n
Dr Mott said the survey results would be used to make urban spaces a more suitable home for microbats and other small creatures.\u00a0<\/p>\n
“So making sure we restore water courses to make sure that they’re healthy and be careful that we use less impactful lights at night,” she said.<\/p>\n
“Planting trees that have really flaky bark can be fantastic because that will allow lots of roosting bats to find a place to sleep.”\u00a0<\/p>\n
The Department of Climate Change will soon partner with the community, including Keira High School, to install nest boxes, plant roost trees and conserve tree hollows.\u00a0<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"A bat about the size of a 20-cent coin has been found for the first time living in…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":56710,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[26],"tags":[30915,30914,30916,30912,547,90,30913,7353,23696,56,54,55,4407],"class_list":["post-56709","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-wildlife","tag-department-of-climate-change","tag-harp-traps","tag-illawarra-species","tag-microbat","tag-research","tag-science","tag-southern-myotis","tag-survey","tag-threatened-species","tag-uk","tag-united-kingdom","tag-unitedkingdom","tag-wildlife"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/56709","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=56709"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/56709\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/56710"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=56709"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=56709"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=56709"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}