Acoustic Bat Monitoring

Citizen Science Center volunteers assist the Wisconsin Department of Natural Resources with their Acoustic Bat Monitoring Program. Volunteers attend a training workshop during the spring where they learn how to use an AnaBat detector attached to a PDA (personal digital assistant) with GPS (global positioning system) to record bat calls. The bat detector translates the bats call "on the fly" to a frequency which humans can hear. In this way, volunteers can actually hear what a bat call sounds like!

Bat volunteers borrow the AnaBat detection system, dubbed the “Bat Monitoring Kit,” for 1-3 nights to conduct bat surveys of local parks, neighborhoods, lakes and trails. Sometimes volunteers survey areas of their choice and sometimes they are asked to survey specific sites. Once a volunteer selects a site to survey, they agree to survey that site three times during the season, once in April/May, once in June/July, and once in August/September. Each survey is between 1-3 hours (a minimum of 1 hour) long and can only be conducted on nights when the daytime temperature is >55 degrees F, there is no precipitation, and the wind speed is < 30 mph. Surveys begin a ½ hour after sunset. Bat monitoring volunteers of all ages are welcome to participate. Volunteers younger than 16 must be accompanied by an adult.