Hear the Bats Flying Overhead Tonight

From search calls to feeding buzzes, discover the hidden night life above your backyard.

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You Likely Have Bats Overhead Every Night

Most neighborhoods host multiple bat species. They emerge shortly after sunset, hunt intensely for several hours, and disappear before most people ever notice. Even suburban yards can see dozens of passes per night during peak season.

But you can’t hear them — until now.

Why Bats Matter

Bats are essential components of ecosystems around the world. Their nightly activity supports agriculture, maintains plant diversity, and shapes entire food webs.

Insect Control

Many bats consume thousands of insects per night. Across agricultural regions, their pest-control services are valued in the billions annually.

Pollination

Some bat species pollinate night-blooming plants, including economically important crops in certain regions.

Seed Dispersal & Ecosystem Health

In many ecosystems, bats help regenerate forests and maintain plant diversity.

Ultrasonic Sound 101

Bat echolocation is ultrasonic. For many insectivorous species, dominant call frequencies commonly fall in the 20–60 kHz range — though across species, calls can span roughly 11 kHz to well above 100 kHz.

Capturing this detail requires higher sampling rates. A 128 kHz recorder resolves calls up to about 60 kHz — enough to know a bat is present. Resolving the higher-frequency species, and the fine call structure that reveals what a bat is doing, needs more.

Not All Bat Sounds Mean the Same Thing

The Bat Edition classifies each of these behaviors in real time. The feeding buzz — the final split-second before a bat catches an insect — is the one that tells you a bat hunted here, not just flew past.

Continuous-Listening-at-Scale

Active-Bat-Nights

Continuous Listening at Scale

BirdWeather’s network of more than 10,000 continuously listening stations captures full nights of sound across regions and seasons. That scale has already supported ecological research — including large-scale analysis of how light pollution alters wildlife behavior, covered by NPR and Science News.

Since June, 345 Bat Edition stations in 24 countries on five continents have logged more than 500,000 bat detections and 56 species. Thousands of nights are already being combined into structured timelines: emergence timing after sunset, shifts in feeding intensity, seasonal variation, and changes in behavior across environments.

This is not just about hearing bats — it’s about understanding how they move, hunt, and respond to their environment over time.

Hearing-Range

Two Ways to Hear a Bat

Over the past year we pushed the standard BirdWeather PUC to 128 kHz — enough to detect that a bat is overhead. That was the door.

The Bat Edition was built to walk through it. At 250 kHz, it resolves the species that call above 60 kHz — much of Myotis, the horseshoe bats, the high broadband hunters — and the fine call structure that separates a search call from a chase from a feeding buzz. Its classifier currently identifies 215 species, 60 genera and 11 families (classifier v53, August 2026) and four behavior classes in real time.

The difference isn’t a spec sheet. It’s the difference between a bat flew over and a bat hunted here, and caught something.

Introducing the BirdWeather PUC - Bat Edition

The Bat Edition is engineered ultrasonic-first. It samples at 250 kHz — enough to fully resolve the calls of essentially every bat species recorded at real station locations, with the FFT resolution and processing headroom to classify behavior in real time. The hardware can reach 384 kHz, but above 250 the chain slows substantially for almost no additional species. We chose the rate that hears the most bats best.

128 kHz opens the door. 250 kHz reveals the detail.

Ultrasonic-first design
250 kHz sampling (384 kHz-capable hardware)
Real-time behavior classification — search, chase, feeding buzz
215 bat species, 60 genera, 11 families (classifier v53)
Preserves harmonic structure
Cloud-connected dashboards
Continuous all-night recording
Bat-specific activity visualizations
Charcoal gray / green color scheme
Rechargeable lithium-ion battery pack
Bat Edition PUC Hut
64GB SD Card (FLAC compression)

Still identifies every bird it hears — BirdNET runs alongside the bat classifier.

In stock. Ships next business day.
Discount codes can be added at checkout.

Non-US/Canada customers can order BirdWeather PUC - Bat Edition at Veldshop.

The Future of Bat Research — and Backyard Ecology — Will Be Built from Continuous Listening

Not by a single lab. Not by isolated recordings. But by thousands of backyards listening every night — across seasons, across regions, and across the full acoustic spectrum.

Bat Edition units have been shipping since June and are listening on five continents — North and South America, Europe, Asia, and Australia. Every station added makes the classifier better for every other station — more calls, more habitats, more species.

FAQ

How many bat species are there?

Current estimates suggest there are roughly 1,400-1,500 bat species worldwide, making bats one of the most diverse mammal groups on Earth.

Do bats all echolocate at the same frequency?

No — frequency varies by species and situation. A review paper reports bat echolocation frequencies spanning roughly ~11 kHz to ~212 kHz, with many insectivorous bats often in the ~20–60 kHz dominant-frequency range.

Does the Bat Edition still work for birds?

Absolutely. It covers the entire acoustic spectrum, from owls right up through vesper bats — BirdNET and the bat classifier run side by side.

Why 250 kHz and not 384?

250 kHz fully resolves the calls of essentially every bat species recorded at real station locations. The hardware can reach 384 kHz, but above 250 the processing chain slows substantially for almost no additional species. We chose the rate that hears the most bats best.

How is this different from a standard PUC?

A standard PUC samples at 128 kHz and can detect that a bat is present. The Bat Edition samples at 250 kHz, which is what it takes to resolve high-frequency species (much of Myotis, horseshoe bats) and to classify behavior — search, chase, and feeding buzz. It’s the difference between detection and understanding.

Is it in stock?

Yes. Bat Edition units ship the next business day from our HQ in California. Outside the US and Canada, order from Veldshop.

Learn More

NPR: All things considered

Artificial light has essentially lengthened birds' day

Hear the Bats Flying Overhead Tonight

You Likely Have Bats Overhead Every Night