Some worry Texas housing development could displace world's largest bat colony

For 10,000 years Mexican free-tail bats have spent the spring and summer in Bracken Cave in rural Texas just north of San Antonio. The popular tourist destination is home to the world's largest bat colony, with an estimated 10 to 20 million bats emerging from the cave every night to blacken the skies with their vast numbers. But developers are planning to build a 1,545-acre, 2,500-home subdivision near the cave, a move that many feel could threaten the existence of the bats, and put residents in harms way, reports Colin McDonald for San Antonio Express-News. (Express-News photo by Bill Calzada: Millions of bats emerge from the cave)

Bat Conservation International, which owns the cave, said the bats can carry rabies, but they also eat several million pounds of insects every night, benefiting farmers whose crops could be damaged by the insects if the cave is forced to be sealed, notes McDonald. Plus, there is concern about where the bats might migrate if they could no longer use the cave. As a result, state representatives are trying to slow down development with a proposed bill that would "put a moratorium on development within five miles of the 697-acre preserve that surrounds the cave." (Read more)