Title: The Secret Lives of Bats: My Adventures with the World’s Most Misunderstood Mammals
Author: Merlin Tuttle
Narrator: Sean Runnette
Length: 8 hours and 42 mins
This book was fascinating! The Secret Lives of Bats is basically an educational memoir about Merlin Tuttle’s life learning and saving bats. His journey started when he was a child exploring caves with his parents and it led him to spend a lifetime educating the public on the good that bats can do.
Like I said, this book was fascinating. Tuttle discusses his life researching bats all over the world and how with each research trip he would learn more about how these animals help the world around them. Along with information about the bats, he also provided some hilarious and harrowing experiences during his travels, like dealing with menacing moonshiners, mountain lions, and losing light in a deep cave by himself. Some of these stories are so surprising and it makes me wonder how he can actually still be alive because of how risky they were.
Tuttle is not a name I knew before listening to this audiobook, but I have seen a lot of his photographs all over the world. His bat photography is legendary because he photographs some of the first photos of a lot of the species out there. As I was listening to this audiobook, I would google every new bat he mentioned and it would almost always be his photographs that would show up first.
Tuttle’s work with bats is amazing. He founded the Bat Conservation International, the Merlin Tuttle’s Bat Conservation, and helped multiple times with getting legislation passed to protect these wonderful animals. It is quite amazing how much one man has done to protect this one animals.
Overall, this is a fascinating book. If you love bats, I highly suggest picking up this book!
Trigger Warnings: Death of bats by poaching, fire, and poison. Close encounters with wild animals.
Red-Haired Ash Reads 