We took the kids out bat detecting. Or, rather, they took us. Into the dark. The clatter of boots hitting the drive. The slow amble of parents. The farm has always had bats. They hunt the back field, then follow the livestock across the pasture. In the open fields they and the swallows play tag, swapping places in the hunt as the sun sets, dipping in amongst each other as the sun goes down, briefly sharing the space as the blades of both their wings skate across the sky, following the drift of insects that the wandering sheep flock drive skywards their wake. The bats hunt the laneway too, where the high touching trees form a tunnel to concentrate their prey.
They wheel over the house, flitting from the barn to the gable ends above our bedrooms . And, since the clearfell, they hunt where the log piles are and where the cleared forest borders the farm. The forestry machinery left ruts that became slits of standing water, insect rich pools. The thrushes and the swallows hunt here too.
As the dark gathered my daughter climbed upstairs and produced a bat detector from the chaos of her room. The night still warm. We had spotted bats in the still light on our walk earlier. Flitting along the avenue, curving in and out of the tree canopy, veering inches from our faces. Carving the air with stacatto wings.
We came back out. Twiddling dials and pointing a high gain microphone at the sky. A pair hunted over the lambing field, skimming in and out of the beech and ash branches, sometimes flushing prey straight through the farm road, high above our heads, sometimes wheeling away and curving high to miss us.
The cattle bellowed paganly on the hill. My neighbours Dexters I think. In the far corners of our farm the ewes called. The goats bellowed for food from the field beside us. And the sky silhoutted against the still in leaf trees as we gathered around my daughters crackling detector.
It would give us seconds warning of the swoop of a bat, the clicks and buzzes getting faster and louder as they turned towards us in the dark The rapid flutter of batwings in sharp relief against the sky. Sweep and sweep again. A carnage of insects unseen by us in the air. It’s a bias. But I hope the dragonflies that hunt here too survived.
My youngest, one hand contained in its smallness entirely in the curl of mine, the other, pointing, tracing the half seen flight of a thing in the sky. My eldest following, twiddling dials, yelping with excitements. All of us giggling and laughing as the fluttering wings of things wheeled feet from our faces
I am lucky. Here. Now. In the quiet wild of my farm with the wonder of my kids. My own wonder too. Holding to both to steady myself in uncertain times. We hold our breath for both.
Bat Conservation Ireland are a nice resource for all things Irish and bat.
