What killed this bat? (Falmouth, MA)

Apr 4, 2012

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At the moment, we don’t know the answer.  But we aim to find out.

Dead bats are once more turning up on properties close to the Falmouth (MA) wind turbines.  Last summer, many were found on one particular property, very near to Wind 1.

This time around, we’re getting an autopsy done, to see if there is evidence of exploded lungs.

Stay tuned.

A bat is born
Naked and blind and pale.
His mother makes a pocket of her tail
And catches him. He clings to her long fur
By his thumbs and toes and teeth.
And then the mother dances through the night
Doubling and looping, soaring, somersaulting—
Her baby hangs on underneath.
All night, in happiness, she hunts and flies.
Her high sharp cries
Like shining needlepoints of sound
Go out into the night and, echoing back,
Tell her what they have touched.
She hears how far it is, how big it is,
Which way it’s going:
She lives by hearing.
The mother eats the moths and gnats she catches
In full flight; in full flight
The mother drinks the water of the pond
She skims across. Her baby hangs on tight.
Her baby drinks the milk she makes him
In moonlight or starlight, in mid-air.
Their single shadow, printed on the moon
Or fluttering across the stars,
Whirls on all night; at daybreak
The tired mother flaps home to her rafter.
The others all are there.
They hang themselves up by their toes,
They wrap themselves in their brown wings.
Bunched upside-down, they sleep in air.
Their sharp ears, their sharp teeth, their quick sharp faces
Are dull and slow and mild.
All the bright day, as the mother sleeps,
She folds her wings about her sleeping child.

Randall Jarrell, “Bats”

  1. Comment by Marsh Rosenthal on 04/04/2012 at 6:38 pm

    I am quite sure that the pressure waves, measured as infra-sound, are responsible for the implosion lesions found in the bat’s lungs. Gross exterior examination of their bodies shows no physical trauma.

    In Nova Scotia, all the emus on an emu farm were found dead subsequent to the construction and operation of an adjoining “wind farm.”

    Human beings are well advised to leave dangerous environments until such time that the massive machines are immobilized.

  2. Comment by Chris Fossenier on 04/04/2012 at 6:52 pm

    There is a good study available from the University of Calgary.

    It is indeed air pressure changes causing the creatures to literally burst apart on their insides.

    Chris.

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