Get Batty on Halloween

Halloween and bats go together like trick and treat. Bats are a Halloween icon because they’re scary, creepy and dangerous, right? Wrong!

“It’s time people learned the facts about bats,” said Ryan Jacobus, age 14, who has studied bats extensively with scientists in his adopted homeland of Costa Rica. Jacobus moved from Wisconsin to the Central American country with his family four years ago to learn Spanish and spend extensive time exploring the natural world. “Bats are cool because they help the environment. People need to know how important these creatures are so they can help protect them.”

To raise the public’s “bat”ting average and help dispel fears and myths about this flying mammal, Jacobus created an entertaining, educational video segment based on his experiences studying bats in the Costa Rican rain forest. The video airs on the web show Super Natural Adventures, which Jacobus hosts with his two brothers, Michael, age 12, and Will, age 11. http://www.supernaturaladventures.com/ www.supernaturaladventures.com

Jacobus explains why bats are environmental heroes. “The main services bats provide include eating thousands of mosquitoes a night, per bat; pollinating many plants, such as avocados; and replanting forests by dispersing seeds,” he said.

Myths dispelled in the Super Natural Adventures bat webisode include:

--Myth: Bats suck blood. Fact: Only 1% of all bats drink blood and it’s livestock they are after, not humans.

--Myth: Bats will fly into your hair. Fact: Bats have a highly developed system of echolocation that helps them avoid large, dense objects, like humans.

--Myth: Bats are blind. Fact: Bats can see. But echolocation is much more precise and thus how bats most navigate.

--Myth: All bats carry rabies. Fact: While all mammals have the possibility of contracting rabies, the most common animals that carry it are skunks, raccoons, foxes, and coyotes.

Super Natural Adventures is the premier web show about nature and the environment. It airs at www.supernaturaladventures.com and features webisodes on such topics as “Where Chocolate Comes From,” “Making Recycled Paper” and “What is a Rain Forest?” A new webisode premieres each month.