Submit your bat carcass records around wind farm survey sites

Eurobats requires member states to submit information on bat casualties at wind farms in order to monitor the potential impacts across Europe and neighbouring countries. Please supply evidence from your sites by filling a proforma and submitting it to the app below.

How to tell us about your records

Fill in the proforma

First, download the proforma here and fill it in with your records.

Columns in bright yellow are a compulsory field to fill in while lighter shaded columns are optional if you are able to answer them. You can hover over each column for a description of what data to enter and in what format, some even have dropdown options to help categorise answers better. If you do not have the information for available for a particular column, please enter NA.

There are TWO sheets to be completed. One asks for information at the site-level, and one asks for information about individual casualties.

Please supply information for all years you have data for.

Upload your proforma

Once you have filled in your proforma, come back to this page and upload it as a .xlsx file to the app below. Once your data has been saved to the database, the app will confirm and you will receive a Receipt.pdf file confirming that your data has been saved. This includes the name, email and timestamp associated with your upload.

Eurobats

Once your data is in the system, not only does the Mammal Society have a copy of it to help with bat research but your records are also passed to Eurobats. You can read more about Eurobats here. Prof. Fiona Mathews, University of Sussex, is co-ordinator of the Eurobats Intersessional Working Group on Wind Turbines and has been working with the Mammal Society and the Statutory Nature Conservation Organisations to create this app with the aim of standardising data collection on wind turbine casualties.

Need help?

If you're stuck filling out your proforma or uploading your .csv file. Scroll to the bottom of this page (below the app) to find more explanation of each of the columns in the proforma and also an FAQ section. If you're still stuck, you can email our Data & Research Officer, Ross: science@themammalsociety.org.

The App

By submitting your proforma to the Ecobat app you agree to the saving of your email address in the event the Ecobat team need to contact you. You also agree to this data being passed to Eurobats for the purpose of monitoring and conserving bats. The Mammal Society transfers data to local or national record centres in order to improve understanding of British mammals. Data inputted into our website is transmitted to the National Biodiversity Network via the Biological Records Centre unless you have specifically indicated that you do not wish your data to be shared. You are able to select that information you supply can be used for the purpose of reporting to Eurobats and research, but with identifying information on the site removed. In this case, data will not be shared with the National Biodiversity Network.

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Filling in the proforma

Download the proforma here.

Below is a list of all columns and an explanation of what is required (this explanation is also found on the proforma if you hover over the column headers). Those below that are underlined are compulsory. Headings not underlined are optional fields (in the proforma they will show up as bright yellow and faded yellow respectively).

ID Number: Add your own identifier for the bat.

Date Bat Found: The date you found the bat carcass written in the format DD/MM/YYYY.

Site Name: The name of the site you surveyed.

Radius of Search (m): The radius of your search written in metres, as the column indicates that the unit is meters, you only need to write in the number, do not put 'm' after.

Percentage Under Turbine Searched (%): An estimate of the percentage of the area under the turbine site you searched. Please enter a whole number, no need to put the % sign.

Number of Turbines Searched at this Site: This number in this column will be the same for all the rows at the same site.

Total Number of Turbines at this Site: This number in this column will be the same for all the rows at the same site.

Search Block Length: This should be the number of days from beginning to end of this search block.

Search Block Occasions: This is the number of days within your search block that searches were carried out e.g. if you did 3 searches within a 10 day window then the search block length would be 10 and the search block occasions would be 3.

Days of Active Season Searched: The number of days between 1st June and 31st September inclusive that have been/will be searched.

Searcher Efficiency Measured? (Y/N): Please fill in as Y or N. If Y, fill in the following two questions, if N skip to Predator Removal Rate Assessed.

Searcher Efficiency : What proportion of trial carcasses are found my observers?

Efficiency Measured for Site or Turbine: Are efficiency trial data specific for this turbine or pooled across the site? Enter Turbine or Site.

Predator Removal Rate Assessed (Y/N): Was predator removal rate assessed. If yes please enter Y and if no enter N. The next question can be skipped if said no.

Predator Removal Rate: What proportion of carcasses are removed by predators during your search?

Bat Latitude: In decimal degrees e.g. the London Eye would be at latitude: 51.503280.

Bat Longitude: In decimal degrees.

Turbine ID: Enter an identifier for the turbine.

Turbine Latitude: Same as for bat latitude.

Turbine Longitude: Same as for bat longitude.

Vegetation Around Carcass: Specify the vegetation around the carcass from the dropdown menu.

Species: Specify the species of bat from the dropdown menu.

Age: Specify the age as adult, juvenile or unknown from the dropdown menu.

Sex: Specify the sex of the bat as male, female or unknown.

Condition: Specify the condition of the carcass as fresh or desiccated from the dropdown menu.

Scavenged: Was there evidence of the carcass being scavenged, select from the dropdown: Yes, No or Unknown.

Injury 1: Select from the dropdown which best describes any injuries on the carcass. If there is more than one injury, you can also use Injury 2 and 3 to fill them in.

Injury 2: Same as for Injury 1 if there is anything else to report.

Injury 3: Same as for Injury 1 and Injury 2 if there is anything else to report.

Eyes?: Were the eyes open, closed, or missing, select from the dropdown.

Infestations?: Select from the dropdown any infestations on the carcass.

Estimated Night of Death: An estimate of the night of death written as DD/MM/YYYY.

Notes: Use this field to add any extra details about the carcass record that you think suitable.

FAQs

My data won't load when I try to select my file

Make sure that you have saved the proforma in the correct format, the file must be a .csv. The app cannot handle excel (.xlsx etc.) file formats. If it is saved as a .csv, try opening the file to check whether all the data is still in columns and hasn't changed format since your last save.

I clicked upload but it didn't work/said server error/I did not receive my receipt

Go through your proforma and check again with the above column definitions that you have filled in each column type correctly, for example date format is DD/MM/YYYY.
Have you selected from the dropdown list where appropriate rather than writing in your own version.
Make sure that all the column headers match the original proforma, if anything has been changed or misspelled this may cause an error.
Check your latitude and longitude columns, sometimes if coordinates are copied over, your lat might be in your lon column or vice versa. Sometimes both latitude and longitude are present in ne column where they should be separated.

Try reuploading after checking these troubleshooting points. If your data still doesn't run then contact us on app@themammalsociety.org with the proforma you are trying to upload attached.

Why do you need my name and email address?

We need your name and email address for two reasons. The first is for if the Ecobat Team notice an issue with your record, for example missing data or something which looks incorrect e.g. a coordinate location in the sea. The second is so that if you need your record changed or deleted for any reason, the Ecobat Team can use a combination of your name, email and the timestamp on your receipt to find your data. The name and email are important because if an issue is linked to not receiving your receipt, you won't know what your exact timestamp is, name and email provide extra assurance that we have located the correct data.

I've uploaded data but there's a mistake!

If you have made a mistake, please contact science@themammalsociety.org. explaining what your mistake is and quoting the name, email and timestamp outlined on your upload receipt (or attach the receipt itself if this is easier).

What happens to my data?

Once you have uploaded data on your bat carcasses it is saved to a database containing all uploads of carcass data. This is held by the Mammal Society. Please refer to the GDPR information above the app for more on this. In the case of this bat carcass data app, your data will also be passed to EUROBATS.

What is EUROBATS?

To find out more about EUROBATS, see the about us section of their website here. A new resolution on Wind Turbines is due to be discussed by member states in September 2022.