{"id":461457,"date":"2026-02-11T04:16:09","date_gmt":"2026-02-11T04:16:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/461457\/"},"modified":"2026-02-11T04:16:09","modified_gmt":"2026-02-11T04:16:09","slug":"bat-almost-never-seen-in-colorado-turns-up-in-wellington-yard","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/461457\/","title":{"rendered":"Bat almost never seen in Colorado turns up in Wellington yard"},"content":{"rendered":"

A rare evening bat, previously recorded only three times in Colorado, was found in a Wellington yard, marking the species\u2019 first known sighting in northern Colorado.<\/p>\n

FORT COLLINS, Colo. \u2014 Wildlife experts are investigating after a rare bat species was found in a northern Colorado yard.\u00a0<\/p>\n

An evening bat (Nycticeius humeralis) was discovered in a Wellington resident\u2019s yard and taken to the Northern Colorado Wildlife Center. It was initially mistaken for a more common species before closer inspection.\u00a0<\/p>\n

According to the Denver Museum of Nature & Science, the species has only been recorded three other times in Colorado.\u00a0<\/p>\n

When the initial call came in about a bat on the ground, \u00a0Executive Director Michela Dunbar said it did not seem unusual. \u201cThey gave us a call, and we talked to them about how to safely get her into a container and get her over to us,\u201d Dunbar said.\u00a0<\/p>\n

The evening bat is common in the southeastern region of the United States but rare in Colorado.<\/p>\n

The bat is small and lightweight. \u201cShe only weighs 7 grams, which is about the weight of seven pennies,\u201d Dunbar said.\u00a0<\/p>\n

The wildlife center is now working with Colorado Parks and Wildlife and other agencies to determine how the bat ended up in Northern Colorado.<\/p>\n

One possibility is that the bat was displaced by weather. \u201cIf she came from somewhere else and got blown off course,\u201d Dunbar said.<\/p>\n

Another possibility is that the bat\u2019s roost, or home, could be in the region. \u201cIf there\u2019s a population of them in northern Colorado, that would be interesting to learn,\u201d Dunbar said. \u00a0\u201cThe weather has fluctuated so intensively, so when it gets a little bit warmer, sometimes they leave their roost preemptively and end up on the ground.”\u00a0<\/p>\n

The bat was not injured when found, but staff said she was dehydrated and slightly underweight.<\/p>\n


\n \"\"<\/p>\n

For now, she is being kept warm at the wildlife center. The plan is to release her back into the wild in the spring. Agencies are still working to determine where the bat should be released.\u00a0<\/p>\n

The wildlife center is not naming the bat. Staff said the goal is release, not long-term care. This is the first known sighting of an evening bat in northern Colorado. \u00a09NEWS asked if there’s a big difference between evening bats and other bat species. Dunbar said “Colorado bats are primarily considered crevice-dwelling, but evening bats are generally considered tree-dwelling. They’re similar in that they’re small, insectivorous, and nocturnal. Evening bats are also somewhat more adapted to warmer climates than our common species.”\u00a0<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"A rare evening bat, previously recorded only three times in Colorado, was found in a Wellington yard, marking…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":461458,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[51],"tags":[79,201],"class_list":{"0":"post-461457","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-wildlife","8":"tag-science","9":"tag-wildlife"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/461457","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=461457"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/461457\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/461458"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=461457"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=461457"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=461457"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}