Wednesday, August 8, 2007

Summer time

Today we took the day off. No housework. No unpacking. No bat-proofing. Nothing. Instead we slept in, did some reading and napping, and headed out to the Giebler's place in Porterfield. Buddy got to run around with the dogs (and chase some cats) and we picked veggies and then pickled them! Afterwards, David proclaimed "we just captured 19 jars of summer!" Good stuff.


On the bat front, we have called in the experts. Judith Johnson came by last night and checked the place out. She has a lot of experience working with bats as a ranger and biologist, and she can even identify the type of bat by looking at their poop (= guano). She had been in our second floor for five minutes when she turned to me and said, "Oh, Amy, I cant imagine a better space for bats. They LOVE it here." I think Judith thought this was rather cool and interesting. We promptly vacated the second floor and returned to sleeping in the living room.

So, we called more experts. There are these guys in Door County (the Hanks family) who have a patented "bat door" that they will install in your "point of access." After you pay them a bunch of money, they guarantee no bats for at least 2 years. At this point, it is *so* worth it. They should be coming out to us sometime soon -- there is a bit of a wait because it is the height of bat season.

3 comments:

Anonymous said...

Hooray! Glad to hear you made it to WI safely. Personally, I think bats are sorta cute and don't necessarily deserve all the bad press they receive. However, I'm a hypochondriac who's also afraid of contracting rabies, and so would not want them--or their guano--in my domecile.

Jerry P

Irina G. said...

but don't forget that guano is good in the garden!

Anonymous said...

Bats keep the mosquito population down so you may want to get some mosquito netting when you get rid of the bats. You'll be fine as long as you don't breathe the guano dust or contract malaria. Rhonda might want to become a tupperware lady so your food can be safe from the cockroaches. Welcome to the midwest!