Wind Farms friend or foe to bats.

With the world going towards cleaner ways of producing electrical power such as wind turbines these alternative are having some backlashes to the animal world. With the growing number of wind turbine farm popping up all over the world so has the death of bats around these farms. Bat fatalities have been confirm at nearly every wind farm in North America, and also at wind farms throughout the world.

As many type of bats species have been found dead around wind turbine there is one specie that seems to be taken the brunt of these hits. The majority seems to be associated with migratory bats, bats that travel long distance each fall and spring and are rely on trees for roosting. The rate of death among these bats is 3 time that of any other bat at wind sites. Study of dead bats at wind farms sites have found bats have died od multiple causes.

Some bats found had know notable injuries but under further examination researches found internal injuries, the damage was to lungs called barotrauma, a sudden rapid change is air pressure that effect the lungs. As for other death , bats striking wind turbines but researches are not sure if the bat are hitting the blades after they experience the pressure effect as bats normally don’t fly into something. But what most death have in common these death seem to take place in late summer and autumn.

This high rate deaths also seem to match the time when bats are at their peak of their summer and fall migrations. There has been some talk of that bats may be attracted to the wind turbine, but is still under study. Other theories are that the fatalities may be associated with migration and mating but again are still just a theory until more test can be done. Other tests are being done to see if the bats that killed are local bats or bats that are on their migrating trip.

As more information is learned and collected is has also been found that some of the bat death are of bats that are not known to migrate. But that is not to say they don’t migrate as for some bat species there in very little known about their habits.

Work is being done by the USGS http://www.fort.usgs.gov/batswindmills/Default.asp

Read more at http://dsc.discovery.com/news/2008/08/25/wind-turbine-bats.html

March 7, 2026 at 9:23 pm | Bats | No comment