Why the bat (in our logo)?
Bats are often perceived as creatures that lurk in the night, waiting to feast on blood. We at Cavi want to clear the air on one of nature’s most misunderstood animals. Bats are actually essential for the environment, perform a great variety of functions for our ecosystem, and are simply fascinating for their diversity and adaptability.
The importance of bats.
When most people think of pollinators, honey bees are the first to come to mind, but in reality, many insects and small animals pollinate our flowers too! Science Communicator from the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service (FWS), Courtney Celley explains, “Bats play an essential role in pest control, pollinating plants and dispersing seeds.” Bats pollinate up to 500 flowers each, many of which are nocturnal flowers that bees can’t get to during the day. Some of these flowers include mango, cocoa, banana, durian, guava and agave (used to make tequila). So, keep in mind the next time you're enjoying some chocolate or having a drink of tequila to thank the bats! So bats are important to us for a variety of foods and drinks that we eat, but they are also essential for saving the agriculture industry over $1 billion on crop damage and pesticides alone. These pesticides that bats replace would otherwise runoff into streams and neighboring soils, contaminating them. This is because many bats eat insects on top of eating nectar and fruit, and in fact, just one of these insect eating bats eat on average 7,000 insects per night in certain areas of the U.S. such as South Carolina, Colorado, Texas, and many more.
The threat to bats.
Every day, bats face the threat of extinction from deforestation, habitat destruction (e.g., logging, mining, urbanization) and cave disturbances (tourism, hunting, persecution). Bats require their caves to hibernate in the winter. Destruction of their habitats in these cold months only leads to more catastrophic consequences for our bats as they seek shelter. Combine that with deforestation and now the bats are also struggling to forage for their food as well. Bats have also been facing a fungal disease called white-nose syndrome, spread by tourists and hunters walking around bat caves with their shoes, clothes, or equipment. Once one bat catches this fungal disease it quickly spreads to all the bats in the caves due to how closely bats sleep together as seen in the image below.
Conservation Efforts.
There are people who are dedicating their time to help protect our little superheroes, but because bats are so widespread, it’s difficult to determine which areas to focus on. Surveillance experts take into account which bats are most vulnerable to the fungus and focus on them. Once they get there, they can prevent the spread of the fungus by utilizing a certain bacterium that inhibits its growth. Here at Cavi, we support the initiative to save the bats. One way we can help support the bats is through the Abandoned Mine Initiative. Hundreds of thousands of mines are scattered across the United States, but miners no longer use them to collect minerals, so they’re just useless, right? Bats don’t seem to think so. Many bats have been found to make these abandoned mines their new home, due to the destruction of their natural habitats. It's not prime real estate, though, because there still needs to be a way to check if bats live there and to protect them. That’s where the Abandoned Mine Initiative comes in. These dedicated people survey mines looking if bats live in a certain cavern. Then they place steel gates to keep people out of there.