A Bridge Just for Bats

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Last month, I told you about a bridge that a German town created only for field mice. Now Germany continues to make animal bridges. This time, it’s a bridge just for bats.

A German town council is getting flack for spending £375,000 (about $604,050) on two bridges for bats to protect them from a new road, according to a report in the U.K.’s The Daily Mail.

The bridges, located in Biberach an der Riss, Baden-Wuerttemberg, are only for flying bats. People or other animals cannot use them. Bats navigate by flying close to the ground, and without the bridges, the new bypass would shrink their hunting ground by half, according to The Daily Mail report.

However, naysayers of the bridge argue that foxes, badgers and deer have been put in danger too, and they want to know why these animals haven’t been included in the plan.

A group of spoof protesters have also chimed in, dressing as Batman and saying they are fighting for the bats’ right to the new bridge. (Photos of the spoof protesters are displayed in The Daily Mail’s report.)

Be sure to also read the Better Roads article, “The Bridge as a Bat Cave,” about how a sharp decline in the number of bats prompted Oregon’s Department of Transportation to build habitats into bridges.