CWHC teams up with Latin American partners for Bat Week celebrations

Bat Week is an annual, international celebration of the role of bats in nature. The Canadian Wildlife Health Cooperative (CWHC) is a proud partner of Bat Week, participating in its organization to help deliver an educational and fun-filled week each year at the end of October.

This year, Bat Week spread its wings bigger and further than ever before by bringing on board partners across Latin America, from Mexico and the Caribbean to Costa Rica, Colombia, Bolivia, Nicaragua, Honduras, Brazil, and more. Pedro Adrián Aguilar Rodríguez represents the Asociación Mexicana de Mastozoología A. C. (AMMAC) and coordinates Bat Week planning with associated partners across Latin America. “We wanted to incorporate more participants from Latin America to show the rich bat-fauna from the region. Also, to meet the different groups and individuals who study and protect bats. Bat Week represents an excellent stage to do so, an opportunity that Latin American bat-scientists and science communicators took.”, says Aguilar Rodríguez .

In addition to Bat Week, celebrated from October 24 to October 30, many Latin American partners also celebrated the Latin American and Caribbean Bat-Day on October 1^st, starting a whole month of celebration for Latin American bat species, coordinated by the members of the Latin American and Caribbean Network for Bat Conservation (RELCOM).

Here are some of the Bat Week activities hosted by Latin American partners.

• Mexico featured Bat Week activities throughout Murci-Semana México.
• Infographics were developed by ‘The Big Bat Theory’ to address the stigmatization against bats due to COVID-19 in Honduras, recognizing this as a new threat to bat conservation.
• Colombian partners, including student groups and University labs, hosted a photographic exhibition, teaching people about the ecological functions of bats and the importance of bat conservation while debunking common myths around bats. Additionally, they hosted live talks at schools and rural communities, aiming at younger and adult audiences, and distribute a booklet to teach people about bats in urban areas and the ecosystem services they provide.
• Additional infographics were developed by the Pontificia Universidad Javeriana Cali in Colombia and the Universidad de Costa Rica on bat echolocation, roosting behavior, species diversity, and research projects.
• Fundação Oswaldo Cruz in Brazil presented on the value of bats and how bats are indicators of healthy environments.
• Also from Brazil, Moregos na praça brought a variety of videos, live talks, infographics and even games as their activities for Bat Week, aiming for a diverse audience.
• The Programa de Conservación de Murciélagos de Nicaragua provided a presentation on the diversity of bat species and the importance of Nicaragua’s bat conservation program.
• The members of Programa para la Conservación de los Murciélagos de Bolivia prepared a folk song about bats and demonstrated a dance tutorial to go along with the song. Additionally, they provided a tutorial on how to prepare typical Bolivian recipes using ingredients that bats contribute to ecologically.
• Mexican partners organized a whole week of online activities, webinars, infographics, and workshops to highlight the diversity and ecological role of bats, which included content about the cultural importance and common beliefs about bats in Mexican society.

Many more live webinars and other virtual activities were hosted by Latin American partners. Check out  the Bat Week website and social media pages on Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter, to find some of these resources. Please note that these materials are in either Spanish or Portuguese, and some will be subtitled to English.

This Bat Week was bigger and better than ever. The CWHC is proud to be working with a diversity of partners across many countries to help deliver this annual celebration of bats.

For a full list of partnering organizations and to amazing resources, visit www.batweek.org

This blog post is included in our Bat Monthly newsletter of November 2021.