'Bats! Bats! Bats!' at Audubon meeting, Oct. 25

Get your Halloween Spirit going at the Audubon-Tehachapi meeting Oct. 25, at 7 p.m. in the Golden Hills Elementary School Cafeteria, 20215 Park Road.

Don Richardson, Animal Curator for the California Living Museum (CALM), and Erika Noel, Biological Field Leader for McCormick Biological, will be our featured speakers covering bat ecology, conservation, and the bat rehabilitation efforts at CALM. The primary goal of CALM, a permitted wildlife sanctuary in Bakersfield, is to rehabilitate and release wildlife back into their natural habitat.

Don Richardson was General Curator at the Moonridge Animal Park in Big Bear Lake, and Senior Animal Keeper for the Los Angeles Zoo before coming to CALM in 2008 where he supervises all animal care operations and development including wildlife rehabilitation, veterinary care, enrichment programs, animal training, exhibit development, acquisition and disposition, educational programs, Eagle Scout projects, the docent program, rehabilitation team volunteers and animal keeper assistants.

Erika Noel received her BS in Biology from Cal State Bakersfield and is a consultant for endangered species mitigation and monitoring. She has worked as a California Department of Fish and Wildlife approved Biologist for San Joaquin Kit Fox task force and a Level 2 Blunt Nosed Leopard Lizard surveyor. Erika has mastered basic wildlife tracking skills, desert tortoise field techniques, small mammal trapping, and holds Rattlesnake Handling certification. Since 2014 Erika has assisted with data collection on California leaf-nosed bats, and has helped to locate and identify three new Townsend's big-eared bat roosts on Tejon Conservancy lands. Erika volunteers in the wildlife rehab unit at CALM where she works in bat rehabilitation.

Join us for a great program, light refreshments, and a raffle. For more information, contact Dixie, (661) 599-1889. Kern Audubon-Tehachapi is a satellite chapter of the Kern Audubon Society.