IT MIGHT sound like the script of a spine-tingling vampire film. But for two teenagers the horror was all-too real after discovering bats lurking in their clothes.
Anna Buchan, a receptionist in Aberdeen, was driving to work when she felt something move inside her trousers. The 19-year-old was expecting a wasp to sting her when she discovered a tiny bat.
However she can perhaps be thankful for small mercies
compared with the experience Abbie Hawkins.
The hotel receptionist, from Norwich, thought the vibrations she could feel as she was driving to work were her mobile phone ringing. But it emerged she had a stowaway bat hidden in the padding pocket of her bra.
Experts yesterday insisted there was nothing unusual about the incidents, claiming it was most likely that the bats had simply got lost. It is thought the recent wet weather may have made many them slightly weaker than usual, and more prone to losing their bearings.
Ms Buchan said she thought the 2in long animal may have found its way into her bedroom and decided her wardrobe would make a good roosting place for the night.
She said: "I had no idea the bat was in there until I was sitting in the car. The movement must have woken him up because he began moving around. I was terrified and started screaming as I thought it was a wasp. I couldn't believe it was a bat. It's the last thing you expect to find in your trousers in the morning."
Despite her initial fear, the receptionist, who owns two pet rats, captured the creature and took it to her office, where she placed it in a box. The "Rat Bat", as she named it, caused a stir with her colleagues, despite spending the day asleep upside down.
Ms Buchan added: "He was the only one who didn't seem the slightest bit bothered about what was going on. Everyone else was really excited. It's not every day we get a bat in the office."
The teenager is used to the sight and sound of bats, as several roost in the block of flats where she lives in Aberdeen. She contacted the Scottish SPCA, which informed her they were a protected species and she had to release it back into the wild.
Ms Buchan added: "He was so cute and small, I was really sorry to see him go. I'm hoping he'll come back."
Meanwhile, Ms Hawkins said: "I didn't notice anything as I put my bra on. The bra was in my drawer but it had been on the washing line the day before. When I was driving, I felt a slight vibration but I thought it was just my mobile phone in my jacket pocket. I just lost my breath when I saw it and didn't know what it was at first."
The bat escaped to a corner of the office, before being captured by a colleague and released.
"Once I realised it was a bat I was shocked, but then I felt quite sorry for it, really. It looked very snug in there and I thought how mean I was for disturbing it."
Jaime Eastham of the Bat Conservation Trust said: "You get a lot of baby bats who're still honing their flying skills at this time of year, and occasionally get a little bit lost. But also, during extremely wet summers, adult bats can become malnourished and dehydrated due to a lack of insects, and they can become weak and lost.
"We run a helpline for people who find a bat in their homes, and June and July are the two busiest months for us."
FACT BOX• In the UK, there are 17 resident species of bat.
• There are over 1,100 bat species in the world.
• Britain's most common bat, the pipistrelle, is 4cm long and weighs less than a 2p coin.
• A common pipistrelle can eat more than 3,000 insects in a single night.
• Bats are more closely related to people than to mice.
• Bats mate during the autumn and sometimes into the winter when they hibernate. The females then store the sperm and do not become pregnant until the spring when the weather gets warmer.
• Pregnant females gather in maternity roosts to have their young.
• They usually only have one baby at a time and can live up to 30 years.
The full article contains 751 words and appears in The Scotsman newspaper.
