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By Janice Boussey

A huge thank you to those members that participated in the Backyard Bat Acoustic Monitoring program in partnership with the Toronto Zoo. The zoo was gracious enough to share their data and give a virtual presentation at our October meeting. They provided a good overview of bats around the world and told us a little more about our local species.

It was an exciting summer watching the data come in at each site. By sharing this information perhaps you can fall in love with bats as much as our member contributors did. One of the questions asked by the project to each contributor was “has my attitude toward bats improved” to which the most common answer was “I have always loved bats”. No scary halloween monsters here, just sweet furry little fliers sharing our outdoor spaces.

A total of 18 sites contributed data to the project spread out over the county from May until September. 

Bat Monitoring Sites

For 4 consecutive nights volunteers mounted a bat listening device at each site. 

It is specially programmed to only listen for sounds of a certain frequency range, those of the bats. Needless to say we did not record all your backyard secrets – only the ones that the bats told

So what did they tell us?

Essex County Essex County Field Naturalists recorded 26,663 observations containing 7 of the 8 possible species! That’s a lot of bats.

Our Ontario bat species consist of big brown bat, eastern red bat, hoary bat, silver haired bat, little brown myotis, northern myotis, tri-colored bat and eastern small footed myotis. Only the big brown bat is not listed as endangered.

Data from each site was collected and uploaded to theToronto zoo. The zoo used a computer program to analyze the data from each site to get the initial results. They will be doing human verification of the data over the next little while. This will allow them to check for any errors or anomalies.

How did this region compare with other groups? 

3 other groups in Ontario also contributed data to the project. Our numbers trended very similarly to the other groups, with large numbers of big brown bats followed by smaller numbers of the other possible species.

Total species observations for each volunteer group. Species newly listed as endangered in 2025 are highlighted in yellow, species remaining listed as endangered are highlighted in red.

Big brown bats have adapted to live in urban areas more readily than those of it’s cousins. If you have bats in your attic, chances are they are big brown bats. It is no surprise then that big brown bats have higher population levels represented as a result

No recordings were found of the eastern small footed myotis in Essex County. This compares with the low numbers of this species by the other groups.

Where were these bats hanging around?

In your yards, of course! And also your pools, golf courses and out in the forests and farmlands. 

The monitoring sites were all on private property. Some sites were closer to homes and human activity than others. A wide variety of sites were used, in both urban areas and rural areas. What they had in common was that bats were found at every site. Many people may not realize that when the sun goes down and those bonfires get lit that you have guests arriving from above to join the party. Bats are just as likely to be hanging around your yard in the city as they are out in the county.

In fact 4 species were located at every single site (big brown, eastern red, hoary and silver haired). 6 sites recorded 5 species and 4 sites recorded 6. None of our sites had 7 or 8 species. All of these sites were spread evenly around the county. It mattered little if you were in a subdivision or out in the open or if you were in Windsor, Amherstburg or Kingsville, bats are all around us.

Bat Awards

These sites earned our “bat awards” because of the interesting observations they brought to light. Prizes consisted only of greater knowledge and understanding of our local bats. 

Small But Mighty Award- Tecumseh near Blue Heron Pond. This site recorded the lowest overall number of bats with 67. Not bad for a very new subdivision in a very urbanized area. However this site also recorded a tri-colored bat which was not detected in some of the sites with large numbers of bats.

Twins Award – Amherstburg – 2 sites were located quite close together although separated by a very busy road. Both in quite well developed subdivisions, one near a golf course, the other close to a pond and farm land. The golf course side had almost double the number of bats 1,576 compared to 690 across the street. The side with the lower number had 5 species while the other side had only 4. This shows that even sites close together can have very different populations and that more bats doesn’t always equal more species present.

Gimme Shelter Award- Staples – Some threats to bats are windmills and light pollution from greenhouses. That didn’t stop this site from attracting 6 species while being surrounded by both. A modest treed yard with a swimming pool gave the bats what they needed to hide from threats all around them here.

Bountiful Batty Award – LaSalle near brunet park – This site came in with huge numbers with the overall largest amount of bats detected at 8,018. 6 species were found here, only missing the small footed and northern myotis.

In Conclusion

Bats are often misunderstood. Studies like this help spread the word about how amazing bats really are. 

When you are out at night, take a moment to look up. You may be missing out on our other winged friends.

Janice Boussey

By Jeremy Hatt

I am excited to announce that ECFNC now has a Butterfly Committee! The Butterfly Committee is devoted to tracking, conserving, and educating on butterflies in Essex County.

As a brand new Committee, there is still a lot of work to be done but we have completed a few primary tasks to get things up and running!

• Created an eButterfly account for the Club to input noteworthy and historical records into the database (the Club has a similar eBird account for the same purpose).
• Created an eButterfly Project titled “Butterflies of Essex County” to gather all eButterfly data across our region. The Butterflies of Essex County Project can be found here: https://tinyurl.com/yfurkfk5.
• Created an iNaturalist Project titled “Butterflies of Essex County” to gather all butterfly sightings across our region. This is an excellent resource to browse sightings and photos of the butterflies in our area. The Butterflies of Essex County iNaturalist Project can be found here: https://www.inaturalist.org/projects/butterflies-of-essex-county.

Longer-term goals:

• Publishing an annual report of notable sightings in Essex County.
• Partnering with Point Pelee National Park to help bring back an annual Point Pelee butterfly count starting in 2026.
• Holding butterfly outings in Essex County or a “Big Butterfly Weekend” to gather more data county-wide.
• Teaching members and the public about eButterfly to increase the amount of data available on butterflies in Essex County.
• Educating members and the public on native gardening to attract butterflies including planting host plants for specific species and what flowers are beneficial for nectaring.

If you are interested in getting involved w/ the Committee or have any questions/suggestions regarding the Committee, please contact me at .

Here are a few online resources to learn more about butterflies in our area:

Butterflies of Ontario: https://www.ontariobutterflies.ca/home
Ontario Butterfly Atlas: https://www.ontarioinsects.org/atlas/

By Aileen Petrozzi and photos by Ellen van Wageningen

Thank you, Brenda Taggart, Karen MacDougall and Peter Kathmann, and Megan Irwin and Roland Chaudat for hosting our first Garden Tour.  All 3 gardens were different and each of them beautiful. All gardeners stated it was work in progress. 

We started in the front yard of Brenda’s garden. Walking to the back of the property we were greeted by a canopy of beautiful trees including paw paw, hop, spicebush, redbud, and black cherry to name just a few. Some were hosts to many butterflies. There were many native plants in open spaces with ponds and a trellis that added a fairy garden feel to the area. This garden has been 25 years in the making and was just beautiful.  Brenda loves Hydrangeas and Hostas so they were intertwined in her garden.  Don’t have to stick with native or non native- put what you love in your garden.  You can definitely see the love in this garden.

Then down the road a bit was Karen and Peter’s garden.  As we walked to the back we were told about the struggles that they had with the property. We rounded the corner and there it was—the lake view to die for.  Walking towards the back there were many interesting stops including big, beautiful trees but the view drew you to the bluff.  You could take the 103 stairs straight down to Lake Erie or mix the stairs up with a path that meandered back and forth down the bluff, enjoying the plants, insects, and butterflies.  The garden on the bluff was mostly native.  Mid way down there was a spot to sit with a breeze from the lake where some of us sat and enjoyed a rest. At the bottom of the stairs there was a small beach and a little Bunkie or shed.  Karen and Peter said they come down to the beach to watch the beautiful sunsets or have dinner.   We brought our lunch and sat on the ground and benches soaking up the view and enjoying conversations.  Karen had her bird feeders out and we enjoyed the songs of many birds- cardinals, orioles, house wren and nuthatch. This garden is 10 years in the making, and they used as much recycled product as possible.  Very impressive garden and the work to restore the piece of property has taken a lot of hard work and hours.

In Harrow, was our next garden: Megan and Roland’s.  We were greeted by them both and welcomed with lemonade.  It was much appreciated with the day being very hot and sticky.  Their garden consists of 97% native plants, most of them labeled. We took the path in front with plants towering above.  This garden also had a canopy of trees: Elm, Hackberry, Hop, Hickory, Sycamore and red Cedars which were dug up from the side of road.  This garden was 3 years old, and it sure packed a lot into a small piece of property.

As you can see, 3 different properties- 25 yr old, 10yr old and a 3yr old.  All beautiful and very different.  

Great stewards of your property. We thank you again.