New Bat Survey Guidelines

Following the publication of the, ‘Bat Surveys for Professional Ecologists Good Practice Guidelines 4th edition guidelines’ in September 2023 there is now a greater emphasis on the use of Night Vision Aids (NVAs), such as infra-red and thermal imaging cameras during activity surveys.  Activity surveys to determine presence / likely absence of bat roosts will now comprise dusk emergence surveys only, with dawn re-entry surveys no longer routinely recommended due to the risk of bats returning early and being missed.  In addition, the minimum time between surveys has increased from two weeks to three weeks to allow a wider sample of the activity over the recommended survey period.

Thanks to Todd Cravens on Unsplash

This extra time between bat surveys will put additional pressure on those sites that may require additional surveys and here at Leigh Ecology we can only stress the importance of booking your surveys in as early as possible, to ensure all bat surveys can be completed within a specified time.