Bat-themed evening to be held at Glacial Park
Swoop on in to celebrate the Year of the Bat with McHenry County Conservation District during “Barn Full of Bats” from 7:30 to 9:30 p.m. Wednesday, July 25 at Lost Valley Visitor Center in Glacial Park, Route 31 and Harts Road in Ringwood.
Enjoy bat-themed games, crafts and activities for the whole family. Test your knowledge of bats with a game of trivia, or see if you have what it takes to build a bat box.
Play a role in “One year in the life of a bat” game to find out what bats do in different seasons. Enjoy a taste of bat-friendly coffee and cocoa. Take home a souvenir from “Year of the Bat” initiative and enter the raffle for a chance to win your very own bat house.
Cap off the evening by taking a short candlelit hike at 8:30 p.m. to the old Northern Pump Barn to witness hundreds of bats exiting for the night to begin feeding.
Juanita Armstrong, Natural Resource Land Manager of the Forest Preserve District of Will County and a longtime bat expert, will be on hand to answer your questions and to show you the latest technology in bat detection.
There she will record bat echolocation signals, translating them into a sound you can hear, and showing them in a sound wave graph that allows her to identify the bat by its pattern and frequency.
Registration is not required for this free event. Call Prairieview Education Center at (815) 479-5779 for more information or visit www.MCCDistrict.org.