Johnny Umuzungu - Bat Boy

Tourism is one of the leading industries in Rwanda. Naturally, the various organizations that are involved are trying to expand this industry in a variety of directions. My buddy Doug is looking to create a rafting experience. He wants to start exploring various rivers starting around March. As you might suspect, I have volunteered to help. ORTPN, the Rwandan wildlife and parks folks are interested in offering cave trekking as an opportunity to do other things in this region besides going to see gorillas.

Thanks to the ring of volcanos and the previous lava flows, there are caves all over these hillsides. Where there's caves, there's bats. We all know that bats are our friends. They consume huge quantities of insects and are required for many plant species to exist due to there assistance with pollination and germination. They are all very unique to specific regions and food sources.

Being a mammal, bats can be susceptible to similar disease that we deal with. In the states, we understand that bats can have rabies just like we can have rabies. Here, the concern is Marburg. Marburg might not sound familiar but it was referred to as an Ebola or a type of Ebola. Does that ring any bells? Back in August, a tourist experienced a cave trek in Uganda and became infected with Marburg.

There is one bat that has been recorded as being a carrier to Marburg and also can die from the disease. That particular bat was in the cave that was part of the trekking experience in Uganda. Before cave trekking is to be offered here, the survey work needs to be done here. I was able to provide some assistance with this work.


Remember, you can click on the picture for a larger view

The survey work included a bat survey as well as a virus survey. It will take a while for the diagnostics to reveal the viruses that these little fuzzy guys had, but we did identify some interesting species. One of which was the Egyptian Fruit Bat (the one with the big nose) that is the one that can have Marburg. Another interesting one was a Horseshoe bat. This particular Rhinolophus had measurements outside of the normal range and could be a unique sub-species. This particular bat has a nick-name, the horseshoe bat because it's nose is shaped like a horseshoe and helps to create a bit of a satellite dish with its ears. It echo locates insects. Also, it has a horn like a rhinoceros, like the center piece in a satellite dish. Very cool.



For me, the creepiest looking one was the Otomops Martienseai. It has a really long nose and can open its mouth really wide. This bat is the moth specialist. It is endangered in some African countries and the bat team was excited about finding so many here.


After processing, the bats would need to be warmed up before being released. I was the bat warmer. We kept them in little cloth bags. After processing, they went back in the bag then I dropped the bag down my shirt. In this picture, I had 13 Egyptian Fruit Bats, the Rousettus aegyptiaca, the Marburg/Ebola one down my shirt. They are a very active bat and all of their squirming around tickled like you wouldn't believe.

There is a complete other issue about these caves that I will discuss next week. for now, I need to run. I want to get some tennis in on such a sunny day. Today will be a different sort of lesson, it will be my first game. Wish me luck (and hope that I don't get Marburg).