Bootsana (the adorable bat in question) has her own adopt-a-bat website here: http://www.batworld.org/adopt_a_bat/bootsana.html
her own MySpace page: http://profile.myspace.com/bootsanathebat
and her very own calendar: http://www.cafepress.com/batworld.166951108
The photos in the calender are extremely adorable!

HE is a SHE, named Bootsana

This is the picture that got me to find out more about bats. Now I’m utterly, utterly in love with them. Is this an Egyptian fruit bat? Some of them look exactly like Bambi! And if you want to see great pictures of flying foxes (my favourite bats) – also babies – google the Tolga bat hospital in Australia (there’s also a guy out there who worked at the Tolga bat hospital and has even more pictures in his blog, some of them truly amazing ones!), it’s a hospital and orphanage for flying foxes.

that is about the cutest thing ever!!!!

Do they nick the ear for some reason like with other species?

You are more likely to get rabies from a squirrel than you are from a bat.

Bats are cute, and cool, and one of the most immediately useful wild animals for humans (their love of mosquitos and blackflies is pretty useful). People should encourage bats to roost in their areas by building “bat boxes” and placing them a short distance away from their house – so they don’t get too close to the humans all the time and get people freaked and stuff. But having them near, so they can keep your yard relatively clear of bugs? Doubleplusgood.

The nick in the ear adds to the cuteness.

Note to folks finding “grounded” bats. Most of the time they are not downed because they are rabid. They are most likely young bats just learning to fly or were in torpor (the metabolism slows down to save energy for short periods, usually during the day) and were knocked from a badly chosen roost. Always protect your hands with gloves or wrap the bat in a thick towel, then place the bat up on a PERCH. This is very important as bats can not “take off” from the ground; they must drop from a height. If you don’t want to interact with it, put a small box over it so local pets don’t make a meal of it and call your local rescue shelter asap.

It is very sad to hear about that young man who died of rabies. How unfortunate he didn’t have screens in his windows or seek attention immediately after awaking to find a bat in his room.
I know statistics don’t really mean much when your emotions take over and your talking about dying in a particularly unpleasant way, but remember a 16 year old boy in Texas is hundreds of times more likely to get killed in a car wreck than by bat-rabies. Rabies is now the 2nd rarest public health risk contagious disease in the US after Polio. Dogs–”man’s best friend”–attack and kill more people annually than bats with rabies do in a decade.

On every continent but Antarctica you are rarely more than 100′ from a bat and think how low the instance of bites/rabies is given how much bats and humans live near each other! We need bats; sure there are risks, but life is a risk. Don’t be scared of cute little bats! Tent making bats are uber-cute http://www.dimijianimages.com/CostaRica-page3/tentmaking-bats.htm Cottonballs with ears!

Very sad about the student, but apparently doctors think he was bitten by the bat.

May 2006 “HUMBLE, Texas — A teenager stricken with rabies he likely contracted when a bat flew into his bedroom and bit him died Friday.

The Humble High School sophomore had reportedly been in an induced coma for several days at Texas Children’s Hospital in Houston.

He began showing rabies symptoms last week. Doctors suspect the teen was infected several weeks earlier when a bat flew through his open bedroom window and bit him as he slept.

Health experts say bats’ teeth are extremely small and sharp, so a person could be bitten and not realize it.”

There is INTELLECT behind those big brown eyes… and LOVE. I never ever thought of bats as cute before, but I NEED this bat. I will be a good mommy to it. Promise!