Silver-haired bats don’t cluster in caves the way many Massachusetts bats do. They roost alone or in small groups under loose bark or inside cracks in dead and dying trees, a habit that makes them easy to miss even where they’re present. Monomoy National Wildlife Refuge, a barrier island refuge off Cape Cod, holds the largest share of the state’s 28 records, likely tied to bats passing through on migration.
Nearly every record falls in August and September, with almost nothing the rest of the year, a pattern that fits a highly migratory tree bat moving through Massachusetts on its way south rather than settling in for the season. NatureServe ranks the species S2, imperiled, here, one of the more precarious bat statuses in the state.
Full species profile
