Thirteen different types of bat have been recorded in Norfolk in the past 50 years.

Their secretive nocturnal habits and hidden daytime roosting sites, coupled with the fact that they spend almost half the year hibernating, makes them a difficult group of animals to study.

The Natterers Bat is thought to be our fourth most common species and is very widely, if sparsely, distributed. They live in the summer in cracks and joints in the timbers of old barns and churches and occasionally in wells and house roofs.

In the winter they hide away in sites such as chalk caves, tunnels, ice houses and lime kilns.

The Norfolk Bat Group aims to increase our knowledge of these under-studied and misunderstood animals.

Everyone is encouraged to help with this task by reporting any found or seen, and helping the conservation of known roosting sites.

Bats and their roosts are fully protected under the Wildlife and Countryside Act 1981.

Picture courtesy of the Norfolk Bat Group
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