Our Bat Population At Kelling Heath

Kelling Heath is blessed with a high quality habitat that the Park protects and enhances with benefits to humans and wildlife, especially our bat population.

2019

The following survey was undertaken by Carl Brooker in August 2019 to determine the various species of bats that are present at Kelling Heath.

The total number of recordings per night:

• 23rd August 2820
• 24th August 6745
• 25th August 85

Bat species detected:
Our provisional analysis of the recordings detected the following species.
The numbers relate to the number of bat passes rather than the number of individual bats.

Species Total number of passes (all nights)

• Barbastelle 13
• Brown long-eared bat 62
• Common pipistrelle 2334
• Daubenton’s bat 29
• Leisler’s bat 6
• Nathusius’ pipistrelle 1
• Natterer’s bat 26
• Noctule 54 Serotine 258 Soprano pipistrelle

Below are details of recordings that could not be assigned with confidence to a single species.
Species Total number of passes (all nights)

• Leisler’s bat or Noctule 20
• Myotis species 21
• Pipistrelle species 768

Note: Pipistrelle species = this refers to a recording of a bat in the genus Pipistrellus that cannot be identified to species. In the UK, possible species include Common Pipistrelle, Soprano Pipistrelle and Nathusius’ Pipistrelle. 1 Myotis species = this refers to a recording of a bat in the genus Myotis that cannot be identified with confidence to species. In the UK this includes Natterer’s, Daubenton’s, Whiskered, Brandt’s, Alcathoe bat and Bechstein’s bat. Provisional analysis also detected possible songs of 1 bush-cricket species. 2