So the last few days i've been doing bat surveys for an ecology company. I'd never done a bat one before so it was all very exciting and interesting! Monday i had to drive 61 miles ( ) to Canterbury. The sat nav i borrowed was riiidiculous, wanting me to go on some la-de-da trip around the bendy countryside roads...Nooo, lets just get there a nice easy way annoying lady! "Turn left...turn left...keep left...recalculating" Urgh!! Me and her had some harsh words. I didn't like her tone . So when i finally get there (no thanks to HER!) the survey is being done on a building site - they had obviously started building big, expensive-looking houses, run out of money, stopped working, got some money later on, came back, then found out a family of Pipistrelle bats had moved in and started having babies! So we were called in to use a bat detector, record the sounds and note down any sightings. The first time you hear a bat's call over the earphones is a really weird experience...you can hear it coming towards you as the echo's get louder and then BAM its flying just past your face! Was very cool! Anyway i got paid £60 for working 8:00pm - 11:00pm - Is goodie!

When i got home i then had a message saying they would like me to help with a Dusk & Dawn survey, which i just did last night/this morning. This one wasn't so far away, only about 40mins, at a farm house that is to be demolished. Such a shame cause it's a lovely old house with rickety tiles and big chimneys and a huge garden and iron windows . There were less bats at this one and in the evening i only saw two actually flying, but heard alot of them. Mostly they were feeding and you can tell this because they make little fart noises! We started at 8:30pm and finished at 11:00pm, by which time i was literally hearing farts every 2 seconds! We then drove about 15 mins down the road to The Roebuck Inn so we could catch about 2 hours Zzz's before heading back out for the Dawn survey at 3.30am...yeeeah 3:30am....

I was wondering what this accomodation was gonna be like, but it was actually real snazzy!! I only had my mobile on me but i took some (crappy) pics cause i was pretty impressed! (No chocolate on the pillow though! )
Double bed all to myself! woooo........................Fancy bathroom with free soap! woooo
Flat screen TV! woooo...................................Free drinks, sugar and teabags! woooo

So we wake up at 3:00am, drag ourselves out of bed and fall into our cars. We nearly had an accident in the car park, where i thought the 4x4 had already driven out, so start going lalala backing out...WOAH near collision! That people, is why you do not drive tired! ...but we did drive tired all the way back to site. There were a few more bat sightings this time and quite abit of Swarming, which is where the bats circle one area before darting into their roost for the day .

Anyway we finished just as the sun was coming up about 5.30am. You wouldn't think it would be so cold on a summers morning, but i think its the moist air or something that really gets into your bones - it was dayum cold !! After we finished i decided to drive home instead of go back to the inn and sleep, which probably wasn't very clever considering i was basically brain dead - i can't recall actually driving half the way home - i just hope my subconcious kicked in at the speed cameras and slowed down !! I was behind a lorry (i think... ) so i'm sure i was fine, lorries don't tend to speed much do they!

Soooo anyway, basically i haven't slept properly since Monday night and think i might be turning into a zombie...bulging, dark circled eyes: check....shuffling feet: check....slouchy back: check....drooling: check. Yup, i'm a zombie