Utah’s pallid bat records cluster in the state’s southwestern desert, red-rock canyons, and low mountains around St. George and Capitol Reef, the kind of country where cliff crevices and mine shafts give this bat roosts within easy reach of open desert flats. That’s where it hunts, dropping onto scorpions, Jerusalem crickets, and large beetles on the ground and listening for their footsteps with oversized ears rather than chasing insects in flight.
Most of Utah’s 220 records come from museum and agency survey data rather than casual sightings, which tracks for a colonial, night-roosting bat that’s rarely seen by anyone not specifically looking for it. Reports spike sharply in July, likely when acoustic and mist-net surveys run hardest in warm weather, not a sign the bat is scarce the rest of the year. NatureServe lists it apparently secure across Utah.
Full species profile
