Whisper of Hope

10/31/2026

Bats aren’t scary … but discarded fishing tackle is … ❌ fishing line abandoned in trees becomes an invisible trap that snags bats hunting near waterways. 😔

✅ Always recover snagged lines and dispose of old tackle responsibly. 👍

Bat Week

10/30/2026

Our final activity for "Little Brown Bat Week" is a bingo card of little brown bats. Each is labeled with it's 4 letter code from their scientific name, so to mark the card you will have to do a little bit of research to find out the scientific names.

You can complete this card any time between Thursday evening when this is posted and Friday at midnight. There are no prizes here, but feel free to post a photo of your winning card when you complete it. We are completely on the honor system.

Mark your card for Hoary bat if you give/receive/eat a frosted food item today.
Mark your bingo card for an Evening bat if you give or receive "side eye" today.
Mark your bingo card for a Seminole bat if you decide to just give up and go sit under an Oak tree covered in Spanish moss today.
Mark your card for a Big Brown bat if you decide to stick your tongue out at someone, even if it's just a little blep today.
Mark your card for a Rafinesque's big-eared bat if you part your hair down the middle.
Mark your card for Mexican free-tailed bat if you find yourself in a big group today.
Mark your card for a Gray bat if you have visited a cave before (preferably responsibly).
Mark your card for a Northern long-eared bat if you decide to wear brown today.
Mark your card for a Southeastern Myotis if you have not left the Southeastern US this year which will include Indiana and Illinois (their range).
Bonus:
Mark your card for Big Brown Bat if you gave anyone any chocolate candy today.
Mark your card for Evening bat if you attended a Halloween party.
Mark any spot on your card if you participated in presenting a non-profit Halloween/Fall festival event for your community this year.

10/28/2026

🦇 The spooky season has us reminiscing about when 66 people from 19 states representing universities, government agencies and private institutions convened here in Mississippi to participate in The Southeastern Bat Diversity Network’s Bat Blitz, an intensive survey to document bat species in the region. Three of our Mississippi preserves—Charles M. Deaton, Robbie Doak Fisher and Herman Murrah—were included in the study. Hosted by the Mississippi Bat Working Group, particpants fanned out across 39 survey sites in 10 counties over three nights to capture and study 255 bats. 🦇 Learn more at our Conservation News page: https://nature.ly/4cQYuvw

10/28/2026

We have started a Bonfire t-shirt campaign (there are sweat shirt options too) to help us raise funds to sustain our rescue through the end of the year, but also begin our preparations for next year as well. We are very excited about this design which shows a bat being released which is always our goal in wildlife rehab. Please share this post so others can see this link and help our organization by buying a t-shirt or sweatshirt!

https://www.bonfire.com/whisper-of-hope-wildlife-rescue-shirt/

10/27/2026

Bat Week Day 4, Little Brown bats continued...

The first time I ever saw a very large group of bats in Mississippi was a morning drive in the delta just before dawn, with the sun just below the horizon, and the owls were still sitting on power lines and power poles. I was driving through corn fields coming up to a creek and there were hundreds of bats moving over the fields, the trees and the road. I just stopped the truck I was in and killed the headlights and watched them as I had never had the pleasure of seeing so many in one place as we don't have large caves full of bats in Mississippi or large bat houses like the one in Florida. I was amazed and a little sad that I could not stop longer and admire them more.

What I didn't stop and think was "I wonder what is the economic impact of these bats tending to these fields?"

I see a lot of that during bat week. Posts "selling" the "why" of bats. And I have to admit it gets to me after a while. Yes, bats help with the process of making tequila, yes they love to eat corn earworm moths, and yes they eat a few mosquitos, but by God, we aren't wandering around asking why are people here? Why are cats here? We aren't making posts justifying the existence of the Giant Panda. Because of pretty privilege and the small minds of supposedly "higher level" humans we have to justify the existence of bats (and many other animals).

If you are a Christian, bats are here because God put them here and last I checked, God makes no mistakes. If you are scared of them, that's fine, they aren't showing up on your front steps trying to sell you a new roof or bad insurance. Just ignore them and if one does show up on your front porch, give us a call. And if you believe in evolution, these little guys have some the most amazing adaptations to fit into their specific environments with bats having some of the highest diversity of any mammal at about 1500 species.

You belong here.

Bats belong here.

Stop trying to justify the right to existence. It's such a short sighted, human centered idea.

Today's "little brown bat" is the Mexican free-tailed bat (also called Brazilian free-tailed bat). They have a long tail that is not encased in a membrane between their back legs, with a rather blocky muzzle and ears that come closely together at the front. They form large colonies and migrate to warmer areas in the winter. They are generally the most docile bats in rehab and you haven't lived until you see one take off running at top speed. It's a sight to behold.

10/26/2026

Please follow the link to discourage sale of these bats as taxidermied decor. Please.

Bats have long been associated with the spirit of Halloween, and no bat is more on theme than vibrant orange-and-black painted wooly bats. 🦇🎃

Yet the truly scary thing about them is how quickly their populations are declining — primarily due to being killed so their bodies can be used for decor.

Whether they're sold pinned in display cases or crammed into tiny fake coffins, painted woolly bats are collected from the wild to be killed, stuffed, and hung on walls thousands of miles from their homes.

Clearly it has to be said: These special animals aren't knickknacks. They're much more magnificent alive and thriving for generations to come.

Thankfully, major retailers Etsy and eBay have barred the sale of bats, but Amazon still sells them.

Please join us in urging Amazon to STOP selling painted woolly bats so their populations can again flourish in the wild — where they belong. ➡️ https://bit.ly/4rGHHjF

10/26/2026

I’ve really let October get away from me and have not done a great job about posting our education events. Today, we visited Three Rivers Elementary and spoke with two classrooms about bats and owls, and we all had a good time talking about our two favorite subjects!!!

We especially want to thank them for the supplies they collected to help us keep our enclosures s**c and span! Thank you Ms Gauthier for the photos!

10/26/2026

Continuing our theme for this 3rd day of bat week…

How do we identify bats so that every 4 out of 5 bats in Mississippi aren’t identified as Little Brown bats? Our main identification points as rehabbers are the same that biologists use- weight, forearm length, occasionally tragus shape (see the photo below with the inner ear circled) and one other identification point for a very few of our rarer bats is the calcar a piece of cartilage found in the membrane that runs between the back legs of bats.
We also consider fur color, if there is more than one color of fur (frosted, different color on the belly vs the back), fur shape- certain bats absolutely have a lovely full pompadour that helps us identify them to the Lasiurus genus and some bats have tricolored individual strands that also uniquely criss-cross at the tips (looking at you, Tricolored bat).

Please see the photos below and remember to never handle bats with bare hands and leave the ID work to the professionals.

10/25/2026

It’s the second day of bat week, and our theme this week is “Little Brown Bat”. Today’s post is about the “Little” part of the description. Every single bat in Mississippi is a micro bat. We have no large fruit eating bats. Therefore, every bat in Mississippi could be referred to as “little”, but remember from yesterday’s post that the Little Brown Bat is not found in Mississippi.

Micro bats utilize echolocation to help them find their prey, but they also have good vision, despite the old wives tales, that helps them see better in the dark than a human.

Today’s brown bat photo is the Big Brown Bat, Eptesicus fuscus, one of our common bats and one of our largest at 15-20g (the weight of an AA battery) with a wing span of 12-14”. Big Brown bats are commonly found in colonies with other species including the common Evening bat and the Mexican Free-tailed bat. They look most similar to the Evening bat, but as rehabbers we can usually tell the difference between the two right away as the Big Brown bat has very luxurious thick fur and a different muzzle shape than the Evening bat. Tomorrow we will talk in a bit more detail about how we identify different bats to species.