Illinois’s 68 hoary bat reports cluster in early summer, peaking in July, which tracks with this bat’s long migration: individuals push north and east each spring before settling into breeding range for a few months. Starved Rock State Park, the Upper Mississippi River refuge lands, and forest preserves across northern Illinois account for the state’s clearest reporting spots, offering the mixed woodland and open water this solitary bat needs for roosting and hunting.
Unlike cave bats, a hoary bat roosts alone in a tree, which makes it far harder to count and helps explain why Illinois’s record total stays modest even though the species turns up in more states than almost any other North American bat. NatureServe lists it as S4, apparently secure, here. Nationally, this is also the bat killed most often at wind turbines, a reminder that its long migratory flights carry real risk even where local records look thin.
Full species profile
