HOW BATEMANS BAY TURNED INTO BATMAN’S BAY

In the last few years, the quaint little town of New South Wales called the BatemansBay gained popularity as an upcoming residential paradise due to its proximity to Canberra, affordable real estate opportunities, and peaceful seaside lifestyle. But in the last couple of months, this town’s image underwent a makeover, turning the unruffled paradise into the town of chaos and misery. Who’s responsible for that? A 100,000 mega bats!

The 12,000 residents of Batemans Bay are having an awful time dealing with more than a 100 thousand ‘grey-headed flying fox bats’ who have taken over everything – trees, houses, electricity wires, restaurants, shops, everything! They are extremely unhygienic, they make screeching noises all day long, they can damage building structures and spread diseases like rabies and histoplasmosis. Because of this, the residents of BatemansBay are feeling imprisoned inside their own houses.

Besides being a huge inconvenience to the locals, these bats are causing the prices of the properties to drop substantially. But despite all the troubles the bats are causing, authorities are not allowed to take strict actions against the creatures as this species of bats comes under the category of ‘protected species’. Irony is that their population was hugely affected by the ongoing global climatic changes and several other factors, possibly caused by humans. The option of killing them having been ruled out, the government is trying alternative methods to scare them away such as dissuading them by using smoke, high pitched noises and bright lights. The officials are also uprooting all the local foliage in an attempt to get rid of the bats.

Animal rights activists from across the country have also favoured these methods and they have told the people of the town that being patient is the key in this situation. But patience is what the local are running out of. One of the residents opened up about the situation saying, she can’t open the windows of her house, she can’t use the clothesline, she can’t study or concentrate on anything because of the shrieking noises the bats make throughout the day. She concluded her misery by saying that they came out of nowhere and these bats are just out of control. For now, the bats rules the town.