There’s a bat in my house, and I’m. freaking. out.
What to do when flying mammal invades your space? One thing is certain: Don’t ask Facebook friends
There are some things you should never do when you have a bat in your house. The most important thing: Never ask your Facebook friends for advice.
That’s like having a head cold, then doing a Google search and diagnosing yourself with a brain tumor.
Let me back up. I had never seen a bat close up before — let alone had one in my house.
But on Wednesday morning as I trotted downstairs from my second-floor bedroom, I noticed a peculiar blackball object in the corner of the stair. I hadn’t yet wiped the sleep out of my eyes or had my morning coffee, so I blew it off as wadded-up piece of paper.
Coffee consumed, I went back for another look. Maybe a frog?
“Whatever it is, I have to go to work. I’ll deal with when I get home,” I thought.
Nearly 10 hours later, I returned home. The black ball had moved ever so slightly. Don’t freak out, Joy. Telling myself to keep calm, I quickly called my brother, who lives nearby, to see if he could come examine it.
“Why do I always have to deal with the freaky crap?” he asked, referring to the time I asked him to get rid of the dead squirrel my dog killed ... or the time I pleaded with him to handle the toddler-sized racoon in my attic.
He took one look: “That’s a bat. I don’t mess with bats!”
Then he whipped out his phone to show me a YouTube video in which bats had taken over a dorm at Texas Southern University in 2007. Bats were flying through the hallways as students were flailing brooms and other objects to fend them off. The thought of bats taking over my house like that left me wide-eyed long after midnight.
So, I asked my 4,000plus Facebook friends for help:
“Open the door at night, turn off the lights, stay out of its way. It should go on its own.”
“Just leave. The house belongs to him now.”
“Suck it up in your vacuum and take it to the dumpster!”
“Borrow someone’s cat, problem solved.”
“Step on it and flush it down the toilet.”
“Burn down the house. Get the dogs out first.”
So what did I do? I left the light on in the stairway, ran into my bedroom, closed the door and hid under the covers until morning. By that time, the bat had moved down a few stairs, so I covered it with a towel (several FB friends suggested this) and called 311, which handles animal control calls.
The 311 operator told me not to touch it. An animal control officer would come and remove it without charge. In the state of Texas, bats are protected and cannot be killed.
Shortly after I hung up with the operator, my brother returned and removed the towel with the bat inside. It had died in the night. Still, Animal Control wanted the dead bat to test it for disease.
I’ve since learned the best thing I did was cover it with a towel.
Now, I can go back to dealing with Texas roaches.