Bideford woman who shares her home with bats

By ksmith

THIS tiny creature, which wouldn't look out of place in the latest horror film, is the newest addition to bat conservator, Jan Whittington's Bideford home.

Pipsqueak is a three-week old Pipistrelle bat weighing just one gram. She is an inch long and is surviving against all the odds.

She lives in her own warm sandwich box next to the Rayburn and is fed milk with a pipette attached to a paintbrush every three to four hours.

Pipsqueak, from Meshaw, is one of five bats currently living at Jan's home at Watertown Farm, Landcross.

Jan, 58, was petrified of bats as a child, but is now the only registered bat carer in North Devon.

She has been a Natural England bat warden for 20 years and over the years, hundreds of waifs, strays and injured have found themselves being nursed back to health in their own private living quarters - her cold, dark shower room.

Some of those she takes in have to be put to sleep as they may have broken legs or wings and she "does not want to condemn them to a life in a box".

But many are released and some she has kept for long periods of time, for one reason or another, the longest being seven years.

Jan said: "The key to nursing them back to health is TLC."

They are handfed with mealworms -which she is now rearing herself in her porch.

She said: "As a child, I was brought up afraid of bats. My mum used to say 'come on in Jan, the bats will get in your hair'. I didn't know anything about them, except that they got in your hair. It was a myth that I believed and I was frightened.

"I was pregnant with my son when I first encountered them 23 years ago.

"I moved into a house in Leicestershire that had a bat roost behind the hanging tiles. I was doing the garden one day and could hear chattering. I was convinced it was bats.

"I was still terrified and was making calls to find someone to remove them. I thought they were vermin and spread disease but the woman sent by the Nature Conservancy Council (now Natural England) told me how harmless and endangered they were and how honoured I should be that they were in my house as they only go to clean houses and don't like dirty, cobwebbed places.

"She put one of the bats in my hand - it was so sweet - I fell in love with it and from that moment on it was a love story between bats and me and I decided I wanted to help them."

Jan joined the bat group there and then, bought books, went to meetings, studied and trained and one year later received her bat licence.

She said: "I have never looked back. I became that woman that came to my house.

"Having been so scared myself, I do understand why people are afraid and as I child, I never have dreamt I would have bats in my house voluntarily."

Jan's son, Greg Smith, also holds a bat licence and the two venture out together in the winter checking bat hibernation sites.

There are many caves, tunnels and lime kilns in North Devon popular with bats and the county boasts 16 different species.

Jan very rarely gives the bats names as she tries to release them all back into the wild.

Those who come to her may have been targeted by cats, escaped from a roof, or fallen from their mother in flight.

If they have been grounded she will isolate them for a while to discover what is wrong as they could be carrying an infection.

She added: "They also have to be released back to where they came from and if we don't know where that was, then we can't release them.

Jan, who used to take the National Trust bat walks at various places across North Devon, is currently working on a count of the third largest Greater Horseshoe breeding colony in the UK - in Braunton.

Her business, Tarka Ecology, was set up four years ago and specialises in bat and barn owl surveys. She runs training courses and is also involved with dormice.

She even has a dormouse called Doris living in an aviary in her bedroom. It was rescued from South Molton but cannot be released back into the wild as Jan does not know exactly where she came from.

She said: "I have been passionate about wildlife all my life. I am a member of so many things connected to wildlife.

"So many people are anti-bats but they need our help and so I decided to fight their cause. It is so satisfying - all the bats have their own character. It is interesting to bring that out. They know me too and they do squeak - they almost talk to me."

Jan can be contacted at janwhittington@yahoo.co.uk or on 01237 459679.