In time for Halloween, California has an official state bat

Halloween is around the corner, and California has an official state bat. Gov. Newsom signed a bill by Sen. Caroline Menjivar to designate the pallid bat as the California state bat. 

Already, California had an official state tree (the redwood, of course) and an official state marine mammal (the gray whale). Now we have a bat, one that lives in many regions of the state. As stated in the bill, this bat lives in “California’s deserts, oak woodlands, coastal redwood forests, and high up into the pine forests of the Sierra Nevada mountains.” 

California is rich in nature, and our lives are better because of it. While the benefits of bats in the wild go much deeper than the monetary value of the “ecosystem services” provided, check out this stat from the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service: 

Recent studies estimate that bats eat enough pests to save more than $1 billion per year in crop damage and pesticide costs in the United States corn industry alone.

Clearly, bats eat a lot of insects. And they keep ecosystems in balance.

We’re pleased to welcome the pallid bat as California’s official state bat.