Bats in my belfry
No, I am not "crazy" as the old adage implies, nor do I have a belfry. But I DO have an attic and I bet you can guess where this is going...
Saturday night I went to bed about midnight, and I was on the verge of sleep when I heard a strange noise - almost like my cat, but not quite - and I sat straight up in bed listening for it again. Nothing. So I went to sleep. Sometime later I heard a "clink" type sound. I don't remember when that was, but I'm pretty sure it was after my husband went to bed around 3, because it was dark in the room (meaning he'd turned off the tableside light I leave on for him). Again, I went back to sleep.
Yesterday morning, I got up around 7 and found one of the knick-knacks from a shadow box on the wall outside our bedroom door on the floor. Ok, that was the "clink" and my husband probably knocked it off somehow, was my thought. I shrugged, put it back on the shelf and went about my day.
Hubs gets up around 9 and tells me a story... Seems he was sitting in the living room reading about 1:30 when the cat started going a little nuts, his head turning every which way like he was looking at something. Suddenly, hubs sees something flying around the room. It's big and black, and he can't figure out what it is. A big black butterfly, maybe? Ok, he has had 2 cataract surgeries since the end of July and retinal detachment surgery a week ago today, so his eye sight isn't great at the moment, but seriously? A butterfly is the first place your mind goes? It is quite obvious this man has never been in a house with a bat flying around it, because yeah, that was my first thought after guessing miller when he said something with wings. So, anyway... He tries to figure out a way to get the bat out. Manages to get it "trapped" in the kitchen, and opens the back door and screen door in the hopes it will fly out. Sees it land on a decorative shelf in the kitchen, but it's gone once he gets a chair there. He looks around some more and can't find it, so assumes it went out and comes to bed around 3.
Fast forward to last night around 9. I'm sitting in the TV room, cat next to me on the couch, when he's suddenly on alert. I know what that means! I look around, and sure enough, there goes the bat, swooping through the living room. I call hubs up from the basement, but by then I've lost track of where the bat is. We look around, but don't see it anywhere so start planning how we can capture it. He thinks of using a wading pool to cover it and guide it outside. I don't think that's going to work, but I let him have his fantasy. We do some googling, and he also gets a packing box to cover it when/if it lands. A bit ungainly, so I suggest a shoe box, and, oh, hey, there's a smallish box right there I haven't put away.
By this time, it's after 10 and the bat has made another flight through the house. (And no, the wading pool didn't work. Bat just flew out underneath of it and whoosh, was gone.) We finally locate it perching on the curtains in the dining room. Unfortunately, there's a gap between the rod and the wall that's going to hinder capture. I open the windows in hopes it'll fly out when it decides to fly again. No such luck, it swoops back through the living room towards the TV room. We now have pretty much all the lights on in the house, and are using a flashlight to check dark spots. If the neighbors notice, they're probably wondering WTF is going on over there? Anyway, we go looking and I spot it resting on the front of one of my shadow boxes in the upstairs hallway. (We keep all the bedroom doors closed all the time, thank heavens!)
It was tiny! Though it probably had a wingspan of 6"/15cm, when it was all curled up like that it was no bigger than when I hold my thumb and forefinger together, about 2"/5cm. So, anyway, we get the aforementioned smallish box over him, and I get a pocket folder to slide between it and the shadow box. Except, oops, the box isn't flat all around, and it sneaks out the bottom, making that same sound I heard Saturday night! And goes swooping downstairs again. Where we lost it. Again.
Things get quiet again for a while, and I'm sitting in the TV room. I swear I'm hearing little sounds like something on the curtain, but I've checked them! Several times! And I've opened/shut them. There's nothing there! But still, I'm hearing these sounds. And so is the cat. I keep looking around, and suddenly, I see a little head starting to peek over the top of a 2'x3'/60cmx1m wood panel picture we have displayed over the fireplace. Found your hiding place, you little twerp!
So, I call my husband up again and we discuss what we can do. He suggests taping a sheet above and on the sides of the picture, lifting it down, and capturing our friend in a different box. Sounds as good as any other plan, so we start taking other things off the wall and clearing the mantel and in front of the fireplace so we have room to work. (As for the cat? Well, his name is Peanut, but his nickname is Chicken Shit because he's scared of everything. So once he lets us know what's happening, he figures his job is done and goes to hide. Probably just as well in this case. ^_^)
Anyway... Just before midnight, we get the sheet taped on the wall, watching to make sure our little friend doesn't decide to fly away in the meantime, and hubs gets the picture off the wall and a box over our friend, who is now between the sheet and the wall. I get the picture totally away (it's heavy and needs 2 hands to maneuver) and give hubs a piece of cardboard (no flimsy folder this time). He gets it between the wall and the bat, and I get the sheet pulled away from the wall. Out the back door we go with our prize (hoping against hope that it's really in there), out to the picnic table closing all doors behind us and shining a flashlight on the box as hubs pulls the cardboard away, and... there's our friend! It takes a moment and then... Away it goes! Fly free, little friend! And don't come back!
We went up to the attic this afternoon, and didn't see any signs of a colony, so guess I'll be outside tonight around 9 to see if I see any friends come flying out. In the meantime, we put tape across the attic door. Hubs is going back to work tonight, and I really don't want a return visit while he's gone. We've lived in this house for 17 years with no previous visits, and hubs had the outside doors open for a while Saturday night so thinks it might have come in by accident. Me? I'm not so sure. After all, this wasn't my first encounter with a bat in the house.
Saturday night I went to bed about midnight, and I was on the verge of sleep when I heard a strange noise - almost like my cat, but not quite - and I sat straight up in bed listening for it again. Nothing. So I went to sleep. Sometime later I heard a "clink" type sound. I don't remember when that was, but I'm pretty sure it was after my husband went to bed around 3, because it was dark in the room (meaning he'd turned off the tableside light I leave on for him). Again, I went back to sleep.
Yesterday morning, I got up around 7 and found one of the knick-knacks from a shadow box on the wall outside our bedroom door on the floor. Ok, that was the "clink" and my husband probably knocked it off somehow, was my thought. I shrugged, put it back on the shelf and went about my day.
Hubs gets up around 9 and tells me a story... Seems he was sitting in the living room reading about 1:30 when the cat started going a little nuts, his head turning every which way like he was looking at something. Suddenly, hubs sees something flying around the room. It's big and black, and he can't figure out what it is. A big black butterfly, maybe? Ok, he has had 2 cataract surgeries since the end of July and retinal detachment surgery a week ago today, so his eye sight isn't great at the moment, but seriously? A butterfly is the first place your mind goes? It is quite obvious this man has never been in a house with a bat flying around it, because yeah, that was my first thought after guessing miller when he said something with wings. So, anyway... He tries to figure out a way to get the bat out. Manages to get it "trapped" in the kitchen, and opens the back door and screen door in the hopes it will fly out. Sees it land on a decorative shelf in the kitchen, but it's gone once he gets a chair there. He looks around some more and can't find it, so assumes it went out and comes to bed around 3.
Fast forward to last night around 9. I'm sitting in the TV room, cat next to me on the couch, when he's suddenly on alert. I know what that means! I look around, and sure enough, there goes the bat, swooping through the living room. I call hubs up from the basement, but by then I've lost track of where the bat is. We look around, but don't see it anywhere so start planning how we can capture it. He thinks of using a wading pool to cover it and guide it outside. I don't think that's going to work, but I let him have his fantasy. We do some googling, and he also gets a packing box to cover it when/if it lands. A bit ungainly, so I suggest a shoe box, and, oh, hey, there's a smallish box right there I haven't put away.
By this time, it's after 10 and the bat has made another flight through the house. (And no, the wading pool didn't work. Bat just flew out underneath of it and whoosh, was gone.) We finally locate it perching on the curtains in the dining room. Unfortunately, there's a gap between the rod and the wall that's going to hinder capture. I open the windows in hopes it'll fly out when it decides to fly again. No such luck, it swoops back through the living room towards the TV room. We now have pretty much all the lights on in the house, and are using a flashlight to check dark spots. If the neighbors notice, they're probably wondering WTF is going on over there? Anyway, we go looking and I spot it resting on the front of one of my shadow boxes in the upstairs hallway. (We keep all the bedroom doors closed all the time, thank heavens!)
It was tiny! Though it probably had a wingspan of 6"/15cm, when it was all curled up like that it was no bigger than when I hold my thumb and forefinger together, about 2"/5cm. So, anyway, we get the aforementioned smallish box over him, and I get a pocket folder to slide between it and the shadow box. Except, oops, the box isn't flat all around, and it sneaks out the bottom, making that same sound I heard Saturday night! And goes swooping downstairs again. Where we lost it. Again.
Things get quiet again for a while, and I'm sitting in the TV room. I swear I'm hearing little sounds like something on the curtain, but I've checked them! Several times! And I've opened/shut them. There's nothing there! But still, I'm hearing these sounds. And so is the cat. I keep looking around, and suddenly, I see a little head starting to peek over the top of a 2'x3'/60cmx1m wood panel picture we have displayed over the fireplace. Found your hiding place, you little twerp!
So, I call my husband up again and we discuss what we can do. He suggests taping a sheet above and on the sides of the picture, lifting it down, and capturing our friend in a different box. Sounds as good as any other plan, so we start taking other things off the wall and clearing the mantel and in front of the fireplace so we have room to work. (As for the cat? Well, his name is Peanut, but his nickname is Chicken Shit because he's scared of everything. So once he lets us know what's happening, he figures his job is done and goes to hide. Probably just as well in this case. ^_^)
Anyway... Just before midnight, we get the sheet taped on the wall, watching to make sure our little friend doesn't decide to fly away in the meantime, and hubs gets the picture off the wall and a box over our friend, who is now between the sheet and the wall. I get the picture totally away (it's heavy and needs 2 hands to maneuver) and give hubs a piece of cardboard (no flimsy folder this time). He gets it between the wall and the bat, and I get the sheet pulled away from the wall. Out the back door we go with our prize (hoping against hope that it's really in there), out to the picnic table closing all doors behind us and shining a flashlight on the box as hubs pulls the cardboard away, and... there's our friend! It takes a moment and then... Away it goes! Fly free, little friend! And don't come back!
We went up to the attic this afternoon, and didn't see any signs of a colony, so guess I'll be outside tonight around 9 to see if I see any friends come flying out. In the meantime, we put tape across the attic door. Hubs is going back to work tonight, and I really don't want a return visit while he's gone. We've lived in this house for 17 years with no previous visits, and hubs had the outside doors open for a while Saturday night so thinks it might have come in by accident. Me? I'm not so sure. After all, this wasn't my first encounter with a bat in the house.