Bats fly into the spotlight in this exploration of such basics as where the live, how mothers raise their pups, and how they hunt for food. Included as well is a simple plan for a building a backyard bat house.

1995 \"Pick of the Lists\" (ABA), Best Children\'s Science Books 1995 (Science Books and Films)

From the Let\'s-Read-and-Find-Out series, this book aims to decrease children\'s fear of bats by increasing their knowledge and appreciation of the little brown bat, the most common in the U.S. The cogent text talks about bats\' wing structure, claws, echolocation, grooming, hibernation, nursing, loss of habitat, and endangerment. Introducing bats as insect eaters, Earle puts their prodigious appetites in terms that children will understand: \"Each night a bat chomps half its own weight in bugs. If you weigh 60 pounds, that\'s like eating 125 peanut-butter-and-jelly sandwiches every day.\" The book ends with fast facts on a few other bat species and simple plans for building bat houses. The artwork, combining acrylic paints and colored pencils, includes appealing full-page and double-page illustrations of bats as well as of children watching them