Thursday, June 11, 2009

McNeil Bats



My brother and his family have some friends currently visiting from Germany. They have been all over Texas taking in the sights and just having a wonderful vacation. The other night we tagged along with them to see the Round Rock bats. Every evening from March - October, people gather at the underpass of IH-35 and McNeil to watch as millions of bats emerge at sunset. It's definitely mesmerizing to watch.



As the time approaches, you can hear their little squeaks and see them flying under the bridge. Unfortunately, you can smell them too ;) They slowly start to form groups and head out into the night in search of food in the surrounding pastures. We've been in our backyard BBQing several times and seen them fly over our house. When you see them up in the sky, it looks like billows of smoke floating in the air.



We overheard one lady comment on how they looked like the smoke monster in LOST. That definitely made us giggle. Mystery solved, LOL. From November-February the bats migrate and live in Mexico. The Congress Avenue bridge in downtown Austin is also a very popular place to watch the bats come out!!

4 comments:

Junie said...

That must have been quite a sight !!!

Anna said...

That's funny about the smoke monster!

Jennifer ♥ said...

That is so creepy and so cool all at once!! I've never seen a bat - I wonder if we have them in CO?

Great pictures - it does look like smoke!

Tammi said...

Too funny about the smoke monster comment, they kinda do! ACK on so many of them, I can't even imagine what they'd smell like!