Glacier National Park’s bats will have a new place to call home with a new mini-condo built for the nocturnal residents by Columbia Falls Boy Scout Todd Ervin.

The 16-year-old junior at Columbia Falls High School built the structure to accommodate 3,000 to 4,000 bats as part of his Eagle Scout project. Additionally, Ervin constructed four smaller bat houses that can shelter about 100 bats each. The bats will use the shelters primarily during the summer.

In the spring, the condo will be installed on 8-foot posts in the St. Mary dormitory area on the east side of Glacier Park while the smaller bat houses will be installed on buildings throughout the park. The structures will provide alternative roosting sites for the bats that may be displaced when park buildings are remodeled and potential bat entrances sealed off.

Installing the alternative bat structures is important because the nocturnal mammals roost in both natural and man-made structures — caves, hollow trees, snags and nooks and crannies of buildings such as loose siding and roofing and between walls or in attics.

“There are over 900 buildings in Glacier and the park owns 750 of them,” park wildlife biologist Lisa Bate said. “A large percentage of them are historic, which means, with the climate, we have freezes and thaws and the siding and roof loosen up to create a perfect place for bats to roost. Bats love roosting in those south-facing buildings, where the temperatures get to 80 to 100 degrees, in the St. Mary, Hudson Bay District office area.”

Based on a recent bat survey in the park by a Montana State University student, 78 percent of 571 buildings surveyed were inhabited by bats.

Biologists have confirmed the presence of nine bat species within Glacier National Park, including little brown and big brown bats that are both susceptible to white-nose syndrome, a deadly fungal infection.

These two bat species are also the most strongly associated with human structures. While white-nose syndrome hasn’t affected Glacier yet, it has spread through 26 states and five Canadian provinces, Bate said.

“The little brown bat is one of the bats that’s been hit the hardest — it’s also the most common bat in the park,” Bate said.

While bats may not be welcome guests in buildings inhabited by people they are an important part of the ecosystem. They feed on insects, pollinate plants, disseminate seeds, and serve as a source of food for predators.

“They are insectivores and where birds leave off in day, they pick up at night,” Bate said adding that they eat hundreds of mosquitoes and other insects considered pests to agriculture. “We definitely want to have bats around.”

“If we shut bats out of all those buildings, that’s a lot of habitat lost,” Bate said. “We don’t want a net loss of bat habitat,” she added, which is why between 10 to 15 bat houses — some of them maternity roosts — have already been set up around the park, but none as large as the condo built by Ervin.

“I was joking that I would never promote condos in the park, but here we have our first mini-condo in the park,” Bate said with a laugh.

The bat condo is 4 feet wide and about 6.5 feet long and has no floor. Ervin scaled down original plans meant to shelter 8,000 bats to suit the needs of Glacier.

While the exterior of the condo is quite nondescript, the dark brown paint serves a purpose to absorb sunlight. The interior is what really makes it a good home for bats. Vertical slats of plywood spaced just three-quarters of an inch apart on the interior walls provide enough room for the bats to climb and hang from.

“We actually had to roughen the surfaces the bats would be climbing on so they had a surface to grip,” Ervin said.

When it is placed on the 8-foot poles, it will keep away predators as well as give the bats room to fly in and out.

Ervin said he got the idea from Barry Wollenzien, the leader of his young men’s group at church who also happened to be a park law enforcement ranger. Wollenzien helped Ervin get in touch with Bate.

The project took a year to complete with some assistance from fellow Boy Scout Troop 1918 members.

“I do a lot of woodwork, I built a tree house when I was 11, but I haven’t done a project of that magnitude before,” Ervin said. “I had to learn a little more about organizing people to come help with the project a couple of times.”

Jeff Mow, Glacier National Park superintendent, noted Ervin’s initiative.

“It’s wonderful to see the next generation take the initiative to provide an alternative habitat for one of our species that is being impacted by disease and development.”

Hilary Matheson is a reporter for The Daily Inter Lake. She may be reached at 758-4431 or hmatheson@dailyinterlake.com.