Florida Spring Training 2017- Day 72

We slept in a little after a long and tiring day yesterday.  Judy did the laundry and we had a late lunch at a BBQ place down the road (Donn's).  It is a "locals" sort of place and the ribs and brisket were delicious.  It is definitely a "no frills" restaurant, that while short on ambiance, had very good food.

After resting a bit the plan is to go downtown to see the bats.  Here is some information about the bats that have become a major Austin tourist attraction:

From March to October (typically), 1.5 million bats emerge nightly from narrow but deep crevices in the underside of the Ann W. Richards Congress Avenue Bridge. They usually start to emerge from the bridge around 20 minutes after sundown.

In June, the female bats of this species of Mexican free-tailed bats, give birth to one tiny pup. The pups feed from mammary glands located under the mother’s wings, not on the chest as in most mammal species. 

The pups are usually ready to fly by mid-August, which means the black cloud of bats emerging from the bridge is even more impressive during this time. In fact, the size of the colony virtually doubles because almost all of the bats that roost at the bridge are female. The males of the species don’t play any role in child rearing and usually roost in separate colonies in Mexico.

A redesign of the bridge in 1980 created crevices on the underside of the structure that were the perfect size for cozy bat homes. At the time, many Austin residents despised and feared the bats and tried to have the colony eradicated. Fortunately, cooler heads prevailed, and now Austinites love their bat colony. They also welcome the flying mammals’ voracious diet. The bats consume up to their weight of bugs nightly.

We did see the bats.  After resting after lunch, we drove into downtown Austin before sunset and waited with a fairly large crowd to see the bats make their evening foray into the sky.  Sunset was at 7:58 pm local here tonight and almost like clockwork swarms of bats left their nests under the bridge about 20 minutes later and headed out in search of insects.  There were a lot of them but it was hard to get any good pictures. The light was not ideal for my camera and they were moving really fast.  Nevertheless, we did see them once again.

After the bat show, we went across the street to an Embassy Suites Hotel for a drink before heading back to the RV park.

We drive to Fort Stockton, TX tomorrow.  Our sightseeing is about done unless we see something interesting and we have time to check it out.  From here, it will be just overnight stops until we arrive in Marin next Tuesday.

Day 72 Pictures - Austin - Bats