NEWS FEATURE: British churches battling bats in the belfry problem

c. 1998 Religion News Service LONDON _”Bats in the belfry”is the traditional way of describing someone who is more than a bit mad. But bats making their home in the belfries and other places of dark sanctuary in British churches are more than just a psychological problem _ they do real damage and can drive […]

c. 1998 Religion News Service

LONDON _”Bats in the belfry”is the traditional way of describing someone who is more than a bit mad. But bats making their home in the belfries and other places of dark sanctuary in British churches are more than just a psychological problem _ they do real damage and can drive curates and sextons more than a tad mad.

This is especially true of the monuments _ the statuary and tapestries _ found in many of England’s pre-Reformation churches.


The simple solution, one might think, would be just to get rid of the bats.

But bats are a protected species under the 1981 Wildlife and Countryside Act, and anyone foolish enough to destroy a colony of bats could be fined up to $3,320 per bat. There have, it seems, been some 10 prosecutions under this act for ill-treating bats.

So, in the words of a document recently published by English Heritage, the statutory body concerned with historic buildings, and English Nature, the statutory body concerned with preservation of nature,”there will on occasion be tension between those who are concerned with the religious functions of a church and the cultural value of its contents, and those whose primary interest is wildlife.” The two bodies’ mouthful of a document _”Guidelines for the identification, assessment, and management of bat-related damage to church contents”_ is intended to offer”a variety of approaches and solutions to these complex conservation issues.” The guidelines note that the artistic treasures found in many churches are vulnerable to damage from bats, whose droppings can cause pitting, long-term staining, and etching, or cutting, into painted wall surfaces, stone, and wooden monuments and sculptures.

Bat urine,”chemically more aggressive”than bat droppings, causes spotting and etching on wooden, metal, and painted surfaces.

Various solutions to the problem are offered by the joint guidelines.

Free-standing objects, they say, can be moved somewhere which is not bombarded by bat droppings and urine because bats tend to urinate and defecate when entering and leaving their roost.

And it may be possible to cover some objects with porous material. But coating with synthetic lacquers raises problems of its own and is”only acceptable for a few objects of low artistic and historic significance”_ not for historic brasses and woodwork.

Better, perhaps, deflector boards placed at an angle beneath the roost or access point can be used to deflect or catch droppings.


Otherwise, however, the options come down to relocating the bats’ roost or access point _ with the risk of simply moving the damage to another part of the church _ or excluding the bats from the church completely by blocking all access points to the building and re-establishing the colony in some new roosting site away from the church, a difficult and expensive procedure.

It is a problem Church of England clergy have learned to live with.

The Rev. Richard Clarke is rector of the church at Clayton, Sussex, just six miles north of Brighton, where a hundred years ago medieval wall paintings dating from around the year 1100 were uncovered.

These, he admits, are”not improved”by bat droppings. But he seems resigned to the problem.”You don’t like to drive them out if they have nowhere else to go,”he said.”It’s a nuisance, but something you have to put up with.” His church is one where researchers found that, although there were only two bats actually roosting in the church, large numbers of other bats were coming into it at night for the bat equivalent of a convivial evening _ and causing a lot of staining.

Still, it seems, there is an answer _ though one apparently unknown to to the two preservation groups. When the Rev. Christopher Ardagh-Walter was vicar of Froyle and Holybourne in Hampshire from 1988 to 1995 he found there was no problem with bats in the church at Froyle, while that at Holybourne was”beset by filthy bats.” The two churches had different styles of churchmanship. Froyle was more Anglo-Catholic, with incense being used. It had no bats.”So I put two and two together,”he said.”I took the thurible to Holybourne for a few weeks, and the bat problem disappeared.”He firmly recommends a liberal use of incense as the best solution to the bat problem _”and it’s not against the law.” Moreover, it seems to have a lasting effect. Today there is still no problem with bats at Holybourne.

DEA END NOWELL

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