September 2000, Our Visit to the Austin Zoo

A World Without Bats

It's easy to look at the things that frighten us and wish them away.  After all, wouldn't you like to wish away the school bully?  Not all things are what they seem to be.  Bats are usually shown as scary creatures that want nothing more than to bite your neck.  This is a myth shown in movies.  

Bats play very important roles in our world.  The Austin bats eat many insects.  In fact 6,000 to 18,000 metric tons of insects are devoured by bats each year in Texas.  In one night the Bracken Cave bats eat almost 200 tons of insects.  This saves farmers and home owners millions of dollars each year in harmful pesticides.

Other bats, which drink pollen from flowers, help create more flowers.  Arizona's cactus plants are pollinated by bats.  This helps to create more cactus plants.

The tropical fruit eating bats also help to create more fruit plants by dropping the seeds in new places.  These bats are playing a major role in preserving the rainforests by pollinating flowers and shrubs.   Without these important mammals, the world would go without bananas, mangoes, cashews, dates and figs.  Tequila would also be a drink of the past.

The bats in Texas have also played much more important roles.  Gunpowder for use in the Civil War was made from bat guano.  Before oil was discovered in Texas, bat guano was sold to other states in the form of fertilizer.  It was our most important exported product.

Bat guano can also be used in  waste detoxifiers, gasohol and antibiotics.

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Bat Facts

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