Location: Sydney, Australia
Address: Royal Botanic Garden, Mrs Macquaries Road
Date: May 2012
Website: www.botanicgardens.org.au
The Royal Botanic Garden in Sydney is home to a large variety of plants. This in turn attracts a large variety of birds to live and eat in the gardens. There is also one type of mammal that finds the gardens very inviting. At one point there were up to 30,000 flying foxes who made their home here.
Sure enough we could see little black creatures hanging upside down in the trees. In the bat world, the Grey-Headed Flying Fox is the largest bat in all of Australia and has a wingspan of about one meter.
After our Choo-Choo ride we did venture over to get a closer look at the colony. When you see them hanging upside down in a tree you might see the thick black wings and a big tuft of orange fur. The big tuft is the fur around their necks. They get their name from the grey hairs on their heads.
To see all the flying foxes take off and go foraging at night would be quite a sight. We were not lucky enough to have witnessed this.
Flying foxes are also known as fruit bats. They only eat fruit and therefore do not need echolocation. Other bats that use echolocation are trying to capture insects mid air. Fruit is a little less agile.
Other bats may have giant ears relative to their heads. The flying fox looks more like a dog or, you guessed it, a fox. The flying fox is the best looking bat. Some bats look like just giant ears and teeth.
Since the large colony arrived in the Royal Botanical Garden they have killed more than 30 large mature trees and damaged hundreds more. The flying fox colonies were moved in June 2012. We visited in May 2012 just before the relocation was to start.
Loud music was played to disturb the bats from sleeping. Maybe a local Sydney rock band like AC/DC would have been too much for the bats to tolerate?
The plan worked and the bats moved to a new location away from the disturbance. You can now find a large colony in Sydney's Centennial Park. If you visit the Royal Botanic Garden take a look up at the trees and you may still see a few flying foxes.
