Date: Mon, 23 Dec 2002 19:56:34 -0500 Reply-To: Maryland Birds & Birding Sender: Maryland Birds & Birding From: rob gibbs Subject: Re: Not quite a bird MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii; format=flowed Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit From your description I would guess that what you saw was a red bat. These beautiful and very common bats are rusty red with white patches. They come out often just before dusk and are seen often near water or in open areas. They will often fly the same patterns over and over as they forage for insects. Unlike most bats that seek cavities or other sheltered sites for roosting, red bats hang from branch tips on trees and bushes sometimes very close to the ground - I once found one hanging among a cluster of paw-paw leaves about three feet from the ground along a trail in Blockhouse Point Park in Montgomery County. Like other species red bats hibernate but they often come out on warm winter days to forage. I have seen them in many years in late January during those almost predictible warm spells flying on sunny afternoons. A friend of mine took a great picture of a red bat in winter hanging in a cluster of dead oak leaves at the end of a branch in an other-wise bare tree. The leaves and bat are covered in heavy frost. Rob Gibbs Damascus, MD Jason Waanders wrote: >Yesterday at about 3:20 pm I saw something reddish-brown with rather >pointed wings and odd jerky wingbeats flying outside my 5th floor >windown in NW DC. I was stumped for a second until I realized that >despite the time of day, it was a bat! > >Judging by the postings over on VA-Birds, there were actually quite a >lot of people who had the same experience yesterday. There are >apparently some species that will come out on warm winter days, and >apparently yesterday brought out quite a few. > >======================================================================= >To leave the MDOsprey list, send e-mail to listserv@home.ease.lsoft.com >with the following message in line 1: signoff mdosprey >======================================================================= > ======================================================================= To leave the MDOsprey list, send e-mail to listserv@home.ease.lsoft.com with the following message in line 1: signoff mdosprey ======================================================================= =========================================================================