Bat Conservation Trust

They fly high and fast, they're rarely seen, and finding where they raise their young is unusual anywhere.

So how did the first maternity roost in Wales turn up in a family home in the Usk Valley? And what can it tell us about a species we still know so little about? Music Hello and welcome to Bat Chat, the official podcast of the Bat Conservation Trust.

I'm Steve Rowe and this is Series 8.

I've spent the past year travelling the UK with a microphone, getting out into the field to bring you the stories behind bat conservation as they happen.

She says the tools are open source, and a survey found hotspots of the rare red-listed Barbastelle bat across South West England.

Leah Gilmer of the Bat Conservation Trust mentioned 90,000 hours of recording.

There was no way we would be able to do this manually, she said.

Notice the contrast with Google, same family of technology.

Yet bats today face growing pressures from habitat loss, climate change, artificial lighting, renewable energy infrastructure and persistent public misconceptions.

Today I am joined by Kit Stoner, CEO of the Bat Conservation Trust, the UK's leading conservation organisation focusing on bats.

Having worked with the Trust for over two decades, GIT has helped shape that contribution across research policy, public engagement and industry partnerships.

In this episode, we'll explore why paths are so important to healthy ecosystems, what their population reveals about the state of UK's biodiversity, how conservation can be integrated into agriculture, forestry and infrastructure development, the opportunities and limitations of AI-powered acoustic monitoring, and why changing public birth supplements may just be as important as protecting the bat habitat itself.

Often called maternity roosts, these colonies are safe summer homes for pregnant female bats to birth and nurse their young.

Bats usually give birth to a single baby each year, according to the Bat Conservation Trust.

The young bats are suckled by their mothers for four to five weeks until they are old enough to fly.

It's unusual,

So Anne, where is our donation, uh, going this time?

Oh, it's gotta go to Bat Conservation Trust.

I think they're just brilliant in all the hard work they do.

They're like the bats themselves, they're small but amazing.

[laughs]

Bat Conservation Trust.

So thank you, Neil.

I really, I really appreciate it.