in the US that might be a be careful for rabies type deal.
this post was submitted on 27 Jun 2025
19 points (100.0% liked)
Bats
1860 readers
80 users here now
Bats are cool
Bats are the only true flying mammals. There are over 1,400 species of bats, and they can be found on nearly every part of the planet. Not only are they cute, they are also important...
Studying how bats use echolocation has helped scientists develop navigational aids for the blind. Without bats’ pollination, seed dispersal, and pest control we wouldn’t have bananas, avocados, mangoes, agave, or cacao… that’s right, bats bring us tequila and chocolate!
Found a bat in need of help?
-
Do not handle it with bare hands! Bats can carry rabies.
-
Here's a map of worldwide rescues and temporary care instructions.
-
Bats should never be kept as pets: Here's why.
Celebrate bats with us!
Our community's mascot is Baxter. Baxter is an Egyptian fruit bat that was cruelly kept alone and confined to a small cage for 12 years before being rescued by a bat sanctuary. You can read the full story by clicking on his name.
Our rules for posting and commenting, besides the rules defined here for lemmy.world, are as follows:
- Be respectful and inclusive
Everyone should feel welcome here. Hateful or bigoted language will not be tolerated.
- No illegal or NSFW or NSFL content
Don’t post anything a fruit bat would not approve of.
- No bat hate
Please don't hate on bats in this community (this includes all of your edgy covid humor).
- No advertisement or spam
Bats don’t like spam.
Related Communities
Community Feedback and Moderation
For inquiry on becoming a moderator of this community, please send a message to the current moderators. Any feedback on the community should also be sent to the moderators.
founded 2 years ago
MODERATORS
while a valid concern, this so rare it should be considered almost nothing
In Washington, there have been two cases of human rabies identified during the last 75 years, and both residents were infected with bat rabies virus. In 1995, a four-year-old child died of rabies four weeks after a bat was found in her bedroom; and in 1997, a 64-year-old man died of rabies; exposure in this situation was unknown.
I didn't know OP was in Washington. Good to know.
Rabies is so terrible, it's worth being cautious in any situation where you increase the chances of exposure.
100% fatal? Check! Slow, agonizing death from dehydration while going insane? Check! Absolutely no cure, and with humane doctor-assisted suicide to avoid the painful death process illegal in most states? Check!
Squirrels are also extremely unlikely to transmit rabies; that doesn't mean it's safe to hand-feed them.
you are very misinformed if you think rabies is 100% fatal l, there's stages to the way it works and only the final stage is fatal but there's cases of survival, so it's not 100%
and rabies are rare in the US and almost non-existent where I live.
here's a very good podcast about bats by a professor who studies them interviewed by a fun host. the professor talked in detail about this subject of rabies and bats
Ok, fair; it's 99% fatal if you get treatment; it's 100% if you don't. Your odds of survival plummet as soon as you start showing symptoms - all it takes is an innocuous scratch, and it can live for months before attacking the nervous system, meaning the incident and scratch that caused it may have already been forgotten by the time you go to the hospital - by then, it's almost certainly too late, and your death is nearly guaranteed.
Do you consider Kurtzgesagt a reasonably reliable source?
How about the CDC? 60,000 people are treated every year. 10 Americans die from it every year, and 70,000 worldwide. Of Americans who die from rabies, 70% contracted rabies from bats; for the rest of the world, 95% got it from their dogs, who contracted it from some unknown animal.
Unless you live in Antarctica, rabies is where you live. It's even in the UK now - they held it off through strict animal quarantines until a decade or so ago. It's fairly rare in western Europe; the most recent death in the UK was 2018, France Spain, and Italy had deaths in 2019.
I'm not arguing that it's common, I'm saying that it's nearly always fatal once symptoms develop and it's a horrible, horrible death. Pascal's Wager applies here. At the very least, if you get a wound from an animal, you can look forward to getting painful preventative vaccines, because you don't know if you got rabies or not, and if you ignore it and you did contract it, you will die. Horribly.
The best option is to not handle wild animals and if you have pets, don't let them run around outside unsupervised.
my problem with your line of argument is your giving it a one size fits all but that is not the case. You are debating it with me but you aren't factoring in that none of what you are proposing is within reason
Bats don't give Americans rabies
https://www.nps.gov/subjects/bats/myth-busters.htm
1% of bats should not be such a concern, especially when my state has only EVER had 2 cases more then 20 years ago
Also, I have NEVER seen the bats that live on my house, as much as I have tried.
Any reasonable person should not touch a sick animal, especially one acting weird. But I don't have any cares or concerns about the bats at my house giving me rabies.
Consider yourself very lucky. Put on a dust mask and shovel this into a bucket. You can pour it into your compost bin, or bury it straight into the soil under your veggie garden or flower beds. Be sure to spread it around as opposed to clumped up together. Do a little more research as you are dealing with a bunch of the stuff so there might be some safety considerations.
Friend had bats in his attic, but they were between the vent screen and the outside. He'd climb up a ladder and check them out. Said they were fucking disgusting, just pissed and shit all over each other.
thankfully they stay outside, no sign they go into the attic. this is the northern side, they clearly prefer that side but we have seen some scat on the east side too. the outside layer under the roof is that 1910 style beadboard so they probably have lots of places to get a foothold. it's Tutor brown so it's next to impossible to see where they actually hide