Bats

I had the great fortune to sneek into a bat handling course at Beale Park on Sunday a rare chance to get so close to these awesome mammals. The one with a darker face is a common pipistrel and the one with the paler face is a soprano pipistrel. Pipistrelles are the commonest British bats, weighing around 5 grams (less than a £1 coin). A single pipistrelle can eat 3,000 tiny insects in just one night!The common and soprano pipistrelles, were only identified as separate species in the 1990s. The two species look very similar and often the easiest way to tell them apart is from the frequency of their echolocation calls.