When George and Cyndi Marks from the Florida Bat Center first began taking their furry friends to educational events 10 years ago, people avoided their booths. Today, after presenting hundreds of programs in schools, they're mobbed when they show up. "A lot of times, it's kids dragging their parents over to see the bats," says Cyndi.

Stories in magazines like Discovery, National Geographic and Ranger Rick have also helped persuade people that bats aren't the blood-sucking, hair-tangling rodents of lore.

Because bats generally come out at night, lots of bats live in places people don't expect to see them. Before it was torn down, the old Buccaneer stadium was home to thousands of bats, and the most successful bat house in the world is at the University of Florida in Gainesville. There may even be bats in your neighborhood - particularly if you live near fresh water where bugs such as mosquitoes tend to congregate.

Seventeen species of bats live in Florida. The most common are the evening bat and the Brazilian free-tailed bat. These are considered "colonial" bats because they live in large groups. In nature, they tend to congregate in dead trees, and they're the most likely to live in a bat house.

Other common bats are the yellow, Seminole and the eastern pipistrelle. Yellow bats hang out in dead palm fronds and Spanish moss; the pipistrelle uses a variety of roosts.

All Florida bats eat insects - sometimes hundreds of insects every hour, including mosquitoes, moths and beetles. Gardeners particularly like bats because they eat pests that damage plants, such as stinkbugs, leafhoppers and cutworm and earworm moths.

The best time to see bats is from about 15 minutes after sunset until the sky turns dark. Look up and you may spot them against the lighted sky, flying erratic patterns chasing insects. They seldom venture out of their nests during the day unless they're disturbed.

Photo: courtesy of the Tampa Tribune Three Golden Manteled fruit bats hang out in an enclosure at the Lubee Foundation near Gainesville, FL

Bats are not flying rats.

They're mammals in the order Chiroptera. In fact, their brains have more in common with ours than rodents, and the bones of a bat's wing are almost the same as our hands, with four fingers and a thumb.

Bats are not blind.

They use a sonar system that's a thousand times more sophisticated than anything man has invented to navigate and find food. It's extremely unlikely that a bat would ever get tangled in your hair.

Most bats don't drink blood.

Of the more than 1,000 species of bats, only three drink blood and none of them prefer humans. The vampire bat (Desmodus rotundus) lives in Central and South America. Its body is about three inches long and weighs about an ounce. They don't suck blood - they use their teeth to make a tiny cut in sleeping cattle and then lap up the blood. Their saliva contains a chemical that keeps blood from clotting. The substance is more effective than anything man-made and may be used someday to help prevent heart attacks and strokes.

Bats are less likely to spread rabies
than most mammals, because they usually die within days of contracting the disease. Still, NEVER touch a sick animal. If you see a bat on the ground, call the Florida Bat Center at 941-627-4180 and they'll send someone to capture it safely.

Even the
U.S. Post Office
is going batty!

A colorful new series of 37-cent stamps issued in 2002 celebrates America's bats. Available at local post offices.

Building a Bat House

Bat populations around the world are declining, in large part because people are destroying their homes. You can help by leaving habitat such as palm fronds and Spanish moss alone. You also can build or buy a bat house.

Wild Birds Unlimited in Tampa carries bat houses, or you can buy them through the Florida Bat Center's online gift shop at www.floridabats.org. Other stores may have them too, but make sure they're large enough. They should be at least two feet tall, 14 to 16 inches wide and four inches deep.

Building a bat house isn't difficult, although you'll need help from your parents to use power tools. Detailed plans and a shopping list also can be found at www.floridabats.org.

Whether you build or buy a bat house, putting it in the right place makes a big difference. Even if you build the perfect home, bats won't use it if they can't find it or it doesn't meet their very specific requirements.

1.   If you build a bat house, don't use pressure-treated wood, which contains toxic chemicals.

2.   Mount the bat house on a post in full sun. Even in Florida, bats like high temperatures. You can paint or stain the outside of your bat house a dark color, which increases temperatures and helps the house last longer.

3.   Make sure the post is at least 10 feet tall - the taller the better.

4.   If possible, locate the bat house within a quarter mile of a source of fresh water. Bats will usually fly to a freshwater lake or pond before they begin to forage. They fly close to the surface and lap up the water as they pass over it.

5.   It's best to locate the bat house away from large trees.

6.   Use a predator guard to protect against snakes.

7.   Be patient. Although the FBC has reports of bats moving into a bat house within a few months, it often take two or three years before bats take up residence in their new home.