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NOCHE INTERNACIONAL DE LOS MURCIÉLAGOS 2013AUGUST 24TH / CABEZÓN DE LA SAL / CANTABRIA, SPAIN

Last August 24th the members of the association CEA (Centro de Estudios Ambientales) celebrated, for the first time in Cantabria, at the town of Cabezón de la Sal, the INTERNATIONAL BAT NIGHT. The event was pro-moted through our blog , the press, the so-http://exploralanoche.blogspot.comcial networks and through a great number of posters, provided by EUROBATS, that were stuck in different points of the Cantabrian geogra-phy, with a special focus on Cabezón de la Sal and its surroundings.

1. Poster of the event with the programme of activities.

http://exploralanoche.blogspot.comhttp://www.facebook.com/ExploraLaNocheDeteccionDeQuiropteros

2. A member of CEA sticking a poster of the event at Cabezón de la Sal.

3. One of the posters stuck in a street of this cantabrian town.

The place selected for the celebration of the event was El Centro de Estudios Rurales de Cantabria, belonging to the University of Cantabria. This fantas-tic building has some appropriate wide halls and an extensive park with old trees for carrying out the activities of the event. From these lines we express our gratitude to the persons in charge of the center for the great interest showed in that the event took place there...

4. Centro de Estudios Rurales de Cantabria.

5. Centro de Estudios Rurales de Cantabria.

We arrived at the place of the event at 14:30 and we quickly put our hands to the work in order to get everything prepared for the beginning of the activities, at 17:00....

6. Members of CEA preparing the main stand. 7. Documentaries and photographs about bats were going to be continuously projected at the room of the bottom.

8. Great enthusiasm and wishful thinking during the preparations. 9. Preparing the room in which the talks will be given.

10. Place in which photographs and documentaries about bats will be continuously projected.

11. Our bat boxes, built by Julio Lavín, decorating a wall.

12. Our official reflective jacket (designed by Ángel Ruiz Elizalde) for our bat walks.

13. Divulgative poster about bats, with photographies and design of Ángel R. Elizalde.

14. Encouraging people to collaborate (Photos and design of Ángel R. Elizalde).

15. Posters of the event in the street to attract bystanders. 16. More signposting.

At 17:00 o’clock people begin to appear...

17. The people begin to come little by little. 18. The projections of spectacular photographs and documentaries about bats fascinated the attendees to the event, children and adults.

19. Displayed stuff causes great interest between the attendees. 20. More and more people are coming.

21. The child workshops had a great success and acceptance, with approximately 40 participating children.

22. An unidentified bat species.

23. Children at the beginning of the child workshops. 24. They had a lot of fun with the activities.

25. Isabel wore an original vest and a bat-like diadem that caused sensation between the children.

26. Painting.

27. Painting and cutting out. 28. Children developing all their talent.

29. This amazed bat was observing from the heights such an outpouring of childish talent.

30. Moment of maximum attendance, before the first talk.

31. The first talk begins at 18:00 o'clock.32. Javier García-Oliva presents a brief and very interesting

"Introduction to bats”.

At 19:00 it's time to install some bat-boxes in the big trees located in the gar-dens of the Centro de Estudios Rurales de Cantabria...

33. Javier during his explanations. 34. The attendees observe and listen with great interest.

35. The talk is a success and finishes with a loud applause.

36. Silvia Fernández showing one of the 4 bat-boxes that would be placed in the trees of the Centre.

37. Ángel R. Elizalde is in charge of installing the bat-boxes.

38. Attendees observe attentively while the bat-boxes are installed.

39. Ángel working on it. 40. The first one is already installed.

The second talk begins at 20:00 o'clock...

41. Raúl Molleda encourages to install the last of the 4 boxes.

42. 3 of the 4 bat-boxes already installed.

43. The attendees are given some delicious chocolates and some soft-drinks on the part of the organization of the event.

44. Isidoro Fombellida is in charge of giving the second talk: “Bats of Cantabria”.

45. Great interest and attention on the part of the attendees.46. Isabel and her sensational diadem went up to the talk during

a few moments.

47. Isidoro during his explanations. 48. Public of all ages in the talk.

49. The talk was a success and finished with a loud applause.

50. Sharing out diplomas and soft-drinks between the children. 51. Painting a great mural elaborated by Julio Lavín.

52. Painting. 53. More painting.

54. This is how the great mural looked like at the end of the child workshops.

55. What an amazing bat mask!!

56. This is a fantastic bat mask too!!.

At 22:30 we started the bat walks in the surroundings of the centre. Some groups of people were formed, each of them leaded by an experienced instruc-tor, armed with an heterodyne bat detector. We detected three bat species: Common Pipistrelle (Pipistrellus pipistrellus), Kuhl’s Pipistrelle (Pipistre-llus kuhlii) and Daubenton’s Bat (Myotis daubentonii)...

57. Ángel Ruiz and Javier Aizcorbe with their companions of SEO/Betsaide, Ana and Javier.

58. Javier Aizcorbe explaining the working of his bat detector.

59. Javier Aizcorbe and Máximo Sánchez explaining the working of their bat detectors.

60. Three bat species were detected.

61. The bat walk was a total success, especially among the children.

Towards midnight we all returned to the exterior of the Centre and the event was declared finished. ...

62. Máximo Sánchez armed with a bat detector. 63. Several bats were foraging around a white-light street lamp. Attendees were amazed with the capture of a medium

sized moth on the part of a Common Pipistrelle.

64. Javier Aizcorbe with his group. 65. Julio Lavín with his group.

66. We estimate that 150-200 people participated in the different activities of the event.

67. A “Family photo” to finish LA NOCHE INTERNACIONAL DE LOS MURCIÉLAGOS.

We believe that this International Bat Night has been a total success and it en-courages us to repeat it next year. We want to express our gratitude to all the attendees, to the Centro de Estudios Rurales de Cantabria for lending us their facilities, to the Town hall of Cabezón de la Sal for lending us the metal stairs used for the installation of the bat boxes, to SEO/Cantabria for lending us its headquarters for our meetings, to EUROBATS for providing us with the IBN posters, to ARCA and FUNDACIÓN OSO PARDO for lending us both video projectors, to NESTLÉ and COCA COLA for providing us with their products in order to give them away between the attendees and, finally, to the members of the CEA for the great work done before and during the event.

Ángel Ruiz Elizalde, vice-president of CEA