Alaskan bats winter in southeast Alaska, and it has always been assumed that Yukon bats head for the same area. Dead bats have been found in the Kluane icefields, showing that bats do migrate towards the coast. One person is interested in finding out whether maybe, just maybe, some bats winter right here in the Yukon, and we have just not found their colonies yet. Bruce Bennett, a wildlife- viewing biologist with the Yukon Department of Renewable Resources, says that people usually do not spot bats very often after the middle of September. But this year they were sighted as late as October 20, and that got him to thinking.
Bats arrive soon after the ice breaks up in the spring and the first insects are around.
Bennett has been asking around to see whether anyone has ever seen any signs of winter bat colonies in the territory, and has not had any luck yet. He speculates that somewhere in the territory there could be a cave or mineshaft heated with geothermal energy that keeps temperatures warm enough for bats to survive in winter. He says that some people have reported bats attempting to hibernate in buildings in the Yukon, but does not think that these incidents really count. The bats could have been preparing to migrate and just stayed too late. He thinks that even that distance is exceptionally long.