For many, bats combine the tiny, scurrying, beady-eyed intent of rodents with the dark unknown of the night. Large leather wings, a sharp pair of fangs, and the ability to find us when we’re lost and vulnerable has been enough to keep the Royal Ontario Museum’s Bat Cave amongst its most popular exhibit for two decades. Today, after a significant renovation, it reopens as a larger educational journey with more atmospheric lights, animated displays, better mechanization (more flapping), audio and video tours, and a new selection of preserved specimens for those looking to go nose to upturned nose with the creatures of the night.

A video display system projects real flight patterns of bats in Jamaica 

Although there will forever be visitors who refuse to enter the museum’s darkest area, petrified at the cave’s entrance, the aim has always been to reveal the wonder of nature’s only flying mammals, to celebrate their powers of echolocation, and the link they offer between us and the birds. Most species of bats feed on nectar or fruit and so can be found perched on tree branches, snuffling away at blossoms. A recent expedition to the St. Clair Cave in Jamaica by museum staff has armed them with the research to customize their cave exhibit to match the ecology of that most renown of natural bat habitats, reproducing its walls and floors and adding a selection of insect specimens to match the community of crawlies who share the dark with the bats roosting above.

The 1,700-sqaure-foot gallery focuses on seven species of bats including the Little Tube-nosed bat, Bourret’s Horseshoe bat, Ghost-faced Bat, Hoary Bat, Silver Haired Bat, and Red Bat. They roost in as a collection of hundreds within the artificial cave, portraying relationships between mother and young and their daily exodus into the night after the sun sets.

Silver Haired Bat 

Red Bat 

For those battling their nerves, the museum has taken great pains to make sure the cave is far friendlier than your expectations. The tour itself is just two minutes long and there is never a moment of complete darkness. CCTV cameras watch the paths for security and the animatronic models are built to reveal their artificial nature, in fact the tour gets a big laugh when one of the bats flies past, glued to a mechanized rod.

To celebrate the new launch, March is Bat Month at the museum and the cave will be included free with admission while kids will be given cardboard bat hats to wear. The Food Studio will be offering bat-shaped shortbread cookies and cupcakes and there will be a number of planned activities throughout the month, including select days that will see very special visits from the living creatures themselves.

For more creepy adventures at the ROM, check out my behind-the-scenes trip into the museum's infamous Bug Room.