WHEN a Cubbington couple decided to hire a Kayak they didn’t expect to get caught up in a dramatic wildlife rescue.
As Becky and George were paddling along the Leam some passersby on the Wills Road Bridge attracted their attention to something struggling in the water. They paddled over and to their surprise found it was a bat.
Becky and George were returning to the boat centre, so took the bat to safety.
The boat centre in the park gave them a cardboard box and a tea towel so they were able to keep the bedraggled bat somewhere safe.
An internet search found them a local bat carer – Tricia Scott and they took the bat to her.
Becky said: “I’d never seen a bat up close before. Obviously it was rather bedraggled after being in the water and we were careful about handling it without touching it directly but when Tricia showed it to us, it was actually quite sweet.”
It took the little bat – which turned out to be a female soprano pipistrelle bat – a few days to get over her ordeal and recover enough to want to eat and then start trying to fly. Soprano pipistrelle bats are one the UK’s smallest bats weighing just three to five grams.
After four days of care it was able to be released back into Jephson Gardens where it could be seen joining other bats happily hunting flying insects over the river.
Tricia added: “I can only guess how a nocturnal bat found itself in the river in the middle of the day. Perhaps it was found by a bird which dropped it when it struggled as the bird was flying over the Leam.”
