10th Annual Meeting
10th Annual Meeting
The 10th Annual Meeting of the MBWG was held at the Pine Ridge Lodge at Lake Tiak-O’Khata in Louisville, MS on February 23, 2012. Twenty-four members attended this meeting, which was held in conjunction with the 17th Annual Meeting of the Southeastern Bat Diversity Network. In addition to research presentation and updates from committees and partners, the meeting featured a recap of the first 10 years of the MBWG along with presentation of several awards recognizing a range of categories.
Twenty nine members from four southeastern states gathered for the 4th Annual MBWG Mist Net Event on June 12-14, 2007. This year’s event was held at Holmes County State Park, and mist netting sites were located in Holmes, Attala, and Leake counties. The US Fish and Wildlife Service sponsored the event, which featured a Bat 101 workshop. The workshop included 6 presentations regarding basic bat biology and ecology. Mist netting was conducted at ten sites: four sites at Hillside National Wildlife Refuge (NWR), one site at Morgan’s Brake NWR, and five sites along the Natchez Trace Parkway. A total of 110 bats representing six species were captured including eastern red bat (19), evening bat (44), eastern pipistrelle (tricolored bat; 11), big brown bat (10), southeastern myotis (25), and Rafinesque’s big-eared bat (1). The Rafinesque’s big-eared bat was especially exciting, as this is a species of special concern in Mississippi and marks the first record of this species in Attala County.
JP Coleman State Park in Tishomingo County was the setting for the Third Annual MBWG Mist Net Event. From June 20-22, 2006, 32 members representing 14 organizations and three southeastern states met to mist net and learn about this unique area in the far northeast corner of Mississippi. The event opened with presentations from Weyerhaeuser, the University of Southern Mississippi, and Mississippi State University. Event sponsors included Weyerhaeuser, University of Mississippi, The Nature Conservancy, Mississippi Wildlife Federation, and Bowhead Informational Technology Services.
The MBWG held its first mist net event on July 20-22, 2004. Noxubee National Wildlife Refuge provided netting locations in Noxubee County and event sponsors included the refuge, Weyerhaeuser, and the Mississippi Museum of Natural Science. Daytime field trips included viewing several evening bats roosting in the Refuge’s fire tower along with traveling to see a maternity colony of Rafinesque’s big-eared bats off of the Refuge. The local news station featured portions of the mist net event on their broadcast.