Bat Roosts in Rock

Bat Roosts in Rock provides descriptions of when the species of bats resident in British and Ireland use natural and man-made rock habitats, how they use them, and the environment each species occupies within them. This data is part of the Bat Rock Habitat Key project.

For the first time it brings together a) historic scientific investigations; b) useful photographic accounts; and c) open access biological records, in a practical narrative.

The text encompasses:
- Descriptions of the features that a climber caver or professional ecologist might encounter on and in natural man-made rock habitats within which bats have been recorded roosting.
- Recording criteria for both the physical and environmental attributes of different features and situations.
- The identification of suitability thresholds against which the recorded information can be compared to assess the likelihood that a specific feature might be exploited by a specific bat species.
- Some suggestions for how to avoid mistakes and misery when performing a survey.

The idea is that the use of Bat Roosts in Rock will generate standardised biological records that will feed into the online database at www.batrockhabitatkey.co.uk. This data will be analysed to search for patterns that can increase the confidence in the suitability thresholds, build new roost features that deliver the environment each species really wants; their fundamental niche on each environmental gradient.