People gathered in Muncie this weekend making small wooden houses at Madjax Maker Force weren’t trying to house local birds.  These were for local bats.  IPR’s Daniel Huber explains why the bats need special places for themselves in the local neighborhoods.

(Daniel Huber / IPR News)

The sold-out event, hosted by the East Central Neighborhood Association, had event goers like Kim Burns construct bat boxes.

“I have bats. I see them hanging around my house – the streetlight – and I thought, I want to make a home for them.”

Read More: The northern long-eared bat is now a federally endangered species

As event organizer and board member Paige Brown says, providing these creatures a habitat encourages them not to live in your home.

“So, we don’t want people to necessarily have to get rid of them or think they have to kill them or anything. We can just put a little house for them, and then they won’t go into your house.”

Board member Erin Lovall has been building bat boxes for years, and as she points out, older homes are particularly at risk.

“Especially in our neighborhood, we have tons of houses that are 100-plus years old, and 100-plus-year-old houses have lots of entry points… So, that was kind of our motivation.”

If you plan to build or buy one yourself, install the box in a shaded area and use lighter-colored material and paint to prevent the bats from suffering from heat stroke in the warmer months.

Daniel Huber is a news fellow with Ball State Public Media’s Public Media Accelerator student fellowships.