27th October 2016

New leaflet available: Bat Rehabilitation – How to get involved

We would like to announce that a new leaflet, Bat Rehabilitation - How to get involved, is now available from BCT. This leaflet is designed, and aimed towards those who are interested in getting involved with bat rehabilitation but are unsure of how to get started. It provides an overview of how to express an interest, how the BCT Bat Care Network is organised and the questions one should ask themselves prior to expressing that interest. To help make that decision, the leaflet contains real life experiences of those already involved; from those newly trained to those that have been involved for a number of years.

The BCT Bat Care Network itself is a network of volunteers through the UK (made up of bat carers, ambulance drivers and wildlife hospitals) who can assist with injured or grounded bats that are found by the general public. The network currently consists of over 400 contacts but additional help is always hugely appreciated! The National Bat Helpline receives an ever increasing amount of enquiries related to bats in need of assistance and through the dedication of those on the Network we are hopefully able to provide that help. In 2015, 54% of enquiries were related to this type of scenario with a 20% rise seen annually. In the summer months we can help an average of 300 bats a week! There is exceptional commitment from those volunteers already involved, but there is also a need for additional help.

The Bat Rehabilitation leaflet was created from the excess fund following the crowdfunding and Bat Care Conference 2015 raffle in aid of producing the Bat Care Guidelines 2nd edition. The leaflet is available electronically and as a hard copy. If you like to request copies or more information about becoming involved please get in touch with the BCT Bat Care Coordinator David Jackson. The BCT team would again like to acknowledge and thank those who have contributed towards the making of the guidelines, and subsequent leaflet to further enhance the support available for bat rehabilitation.

To find out more about bacoming a bat carer: http://www.bats.org.uk/pages/batcare.html

To donate towards bat conservation https://www.justgiving.com/bats

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