Collecting cave samples
Collecting samples from the bats has some pros and cons compared to under the roost trees. Firstly outside weather isn’t as important, the urine and faeces samples are smaller in size but are in abundance with thousands of bats roosting inside, it is a very cool experience to walk and climb through the caves and it isn’t as smelly as the large fruit bats! On the downside it is very humid, often difficult to find the entrances, very slippery and there are cockroaches!
After laying down the plastic tarps in the afternoon we left the roost for several hours and came back to do the first round of sample collection that night. It is important that the samples are as fresh as possible and the collection is timed to avoid disturbing the bats’ sunset departure for foraging. In the morning we returned to find the sheets exactly where we left them (perfect) and tarps covered in samples!!
The urine is collected with a combination of swabs and pipettes and placed into tubes containing a type of preservative liquid. The faeces are collected in a similar method but more using swabs as chopsticks. We were able to fill our quota for this site so the the whole team (my guides, field assistants and myself) were very happy.
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