This bat cave has nothing to do with the movies’ Bruce Wayne.
What J. David Bamberger is building on his ranch in Johnson City is more fantastic than Hollywood’s version simply because it is real.
Spurred by his fascination with bats and concerned that urban sprawl is destroying the migratory creatures’ habitats, the wealthy retired rancher has spent the last year working on a $250,000 bat cave on his ranch 50 miles west of Austin. Bamberger hopes the 8,000-square-foot cave will become home to 1 million bats, making it the largest artificial bat house in the world, he says.
When it opens next summer, the cave will be a luxury resort of sorts, custom made to cater to a bat’s every whim: soothing infrared lighting, dark crevices from which to dangle, nearby ponds teeming with insect life–all in a temperature-controlled environment.
Presumably the bats would be hard pressed to resist a structure so lovingly created for them. But, there is no guarantee a single bat would check in. No one, not even bat scholars, can guarantee the bats will come.
Bamberger hopes the bats will find his Johnson City cave.
“How can they resist?” he asks, surveying the cave’s inner chambers. “I sure hope they come–and bring their friends.”
Bamberger thinks the so-called chiroptorium is an experiment worth trying. Not only would it provide much-needed shelter for bats, the cave would also give scientists a research opportunity unmatched in the world, he says.
The 5-year-old idea to build the cave became reality last March when Bamberger, 69, persuaded design engineer Jim Smith of Santa Fe, N.M., to take on the project. Smith, after consulting with bat experts around the world, designed a three-domed steel structure that includes an observation room for researchers.
The gray-domed exterior now resembles something belonging in a science fiction movie. By spring, however, it will be smothered by the surrounding rocky terrain, leaving only its entrance exposed. The cave is expected to be ready by June, when pregnant bats swarm the Texas Hill Country looking for maternity wards.
Bamberger, a self-made millionaire who stepped down as chairman of Church’s Fried Chicken in 1989, is a longtime trustee of the Austin-based advocacy group Bat Conservation International.
After rival Popeye’s Famous Fried Chicken bought a controlling stake in Church’s for about $283.5 million in 1988, Bamberger pursued what has now become a second career: conservation.
In recent years, he has focused on encouraging private-sector involvement in conservation efforts. Over the years, his ranch has played host to more than 15,000 visitors interested in protecting endangered species, and Bamberger has traveled across the country speaking about his efforts. He’s not shy about putting his checkbook where his mouth is.
“I’ll experiment with anything,” he says. “We’ve been so destructive, careless and uncaring about the natural world. This cave may be one way to mitigate the damage and demonstrate to others that man-made habitat works.”
Bamberger concedes some people find his passion, well, batty.
” `Oh, Bamberger, you’re as goofy as you can be, spending all that money on a bat house,’ ” he says, quoting skeptics. “People think you’ve gone looney-tunes.”
The scientific community, however, is excited.
Gary Graham, chief of the endangered resources branch of the Texas Parks and Wildlife Department, says the cave could be a benchmark for bat research. Scholars from around the globe are eager to swarm Central Texas to study bat behavior.
“Should this populate like we’re expecting, this is the only place where bat behavior can be studied without donning a big respirator and going into a cave with lights,” Bamberger says. “There will be no charge whatsoever to the scientific community whether it’s a student at the university or a Ph.D. that is doing research on bats.”
Ken Glover, manager of pest control at the University of Florida at Gainesville, currently the home of the largest artificial bat house with about 60,000 inhabitants and a capacity for 250,000, says he is sure bats will take to the Hill Country retreat.
“There is a real housing shortage, with old mines being sealed up and barns and steeples coming down,” Glover says. “The newer architecture is not nearly as friendly.”
If the gamble pays off, Bamberger says, several wealthy Texans are prepared to follow his example and build their own bat communities to further research.
