Junior Leads Collaborative Effort to Help Endangered Bat Species
Muhlenberg student Sophie Tomov ’26 spearheaded a change to the College’s bat removal policy in order to make the survival of captured bats more likely.By: Meghan Kita Thursday, December 12, 2024 08:40 AM
Sophie Tomov ’26 with the bat she rescued on campusPrior to January, Sophie Tomov ’26 didn’t know much about bats. One day late that month, she was leaving for class and nearly stepped on an injured bat lying in the grass. She called the Department of Animal Control, who connected her with Barbera Miller, a local wildlife specialist with ties to the Pennsylvania Bat Conservation and Rehabilitation center. Miller advised Tomov about how to contain the bat until she could arrive.
“On this campus, no matter how crazy your idea is, there is someone around to help you get it off the ground. ... I feel very lucky to be on a campus like this.”
—Sophie Tomov ’26
“I always carry gloves with me, so I put those on and gently nudged the bat into a cardboard container, being careful to avoid its wings,” says Tomov, a biology and French double major. After Miller came to retrieve the bat, Tomov “learned of the endangered status of bats, how often bats are found injured or disrupted on college campuses (especially those with old buildings, like ours) and how often attempts to help them leave them stranded.”
Tomov also learned that the survival of bats is important because they feed on insects that destroy crops and spread disease. This inspired her to look into how the College handles bats that need to be removed from campus, and then, to propose a better way.
Tomov reached out to enACT (Muhlenberg’s Environmental Action Team), which connected her with Sustainability Specialist Natalie Sobrinski. Sobrinski and Tomov collaborated with Muhlenberg staff from campus safety, plant operations and housekeeping, as well as staff from Pennsylvania Bat Conservation and Rehabilitation, to come up with Muhlenberg’s new bat removal policy, which went into effect last month.
The biggest change? Bats will no longer be captured and released outside (where they will likely die), but rather be captured and released to the care of Pennsylvania Bat Conservation and Rehabilitation.
“On this campus, no matter how crazy your idea is, there is someone around to help you get it off the ground,” Tomov says. “I thought it would be a bigger fight to convince campus officials that bats were worth helping and saving. But wherever I turned, people were supportive and received the project well. I feel very lucky to be on a campus like this.”
