Mexican Free-tail Bat

Distribution

Reproduction

Habitat

Diet

Mortality

Management

Literature Cited

Management

The bat in general has suffered a very negative public perception.  Often bats are associated with vampires or rabies, though there are no vampires and only small amounts have rabies in bat populations.  A study of 430 bats was conducted in order to examine rabies frequency.  Of that group only 105 were positive this seems high but that is a small number of the total population (Schmidly 1999).  This negative connotation has lead to many large-scale destructions of cave habitats.  Though the Mexican free-tail bat population is not low, with only few colony sites and human populations growth one can see the potential problem in destruction of a roost site (TPWD Website).  The destruction of old buildings is also contributing to population declines as these bats often roost in abandon structures.  In order to obtain the high quantities of protein needed to rear the young, bats consume large quantities of insects every night.  This is beneficial to farmers, vegetation, and crops.  The simplest form of management for this bat is to simply try to preserve the habitat we currently have and to create more structures like bridges and other artificial roost sites (TPWD website).  Like any other management plan there is a need for public education on the species, maybe more so due to the negative public opinion.