A large cave in North Side is being excavated and surveyed as a preliminary part of a future development as a tourist attraction site. Bat experts fear that any disturbance will cause the bats to 
fly away.

The developer and owner of the caves, on the other hand, says that he brought the caves in 1997 with a view to protecting and preserving them, while making them accessible to tourists.

The Department of Environment’s Manager of Terrestrial Ecology, Mat Cottam, said: “This is one of the most important sites for bats in the Cayman Islands and is specifically identified in the National Biodiversity Action Plan as a key site.” It’s an important site for Jamaican Fruit Bats, and also a historical site for a huge population of Brazilian Free-tailed bats too, Dr. Cottam said.

However, bats can be very particular picky about where they live: “Cave-living bats are very sensitive to factors such as temperature and even air currents.

The bats will pick out every thing that we might think of as cosmetic, such as enlarging the entrance; but from a bat’s perspective, these are quite significant factors,” Dr. Cottam said.

Dr. Cottam said he had visited the site prior to the latest excavations: “There are about 50 Jamaican fruit bats there. I understand there was a large backhoe digging at the entrance to the cave. I would be surprised if there were any bats left in the cave after that,” he commented. Dr. Cottam said he was aware of the proposal to develop the site as a tourist attraction, and said that his primary concern was disturbance that might drive the bats away.

“There are places in the world with tourist attractions and bats, but the encroachment by tourists in these places is very light. It is is something that could work here if managed properly.” Dr. Cottam expressed frustration that the National Conservation Law, drafted a decade ago, but never passed, would have protected bats, but at present there was no legal protection for bats under Cayman Islands law.

Owner of the Caves Christian Sorensen said: “I am planning a national attraction modelled after the Harrison Caves in Barbados, where tourists in groups of up to 20 could go and look around the caves with a tourist guide. “There are several hundred caves, and many of them contain rare bats, but only about five will be open to the public, and the other ones will be left alone. We are not going to be disturbing the rare bats in the other caves.”

Mr. Sorensen maintained that his interest lies in protecting the caves from other disturbances: “I bought the caves in 1997 so that I could preserve them. We had a problem with illegal tourism, with tour operators taking parties of tourists to the caves. Some of them were stealing stalactites. People were going there and having parties, lighting fires, and leaving trash behind,” he said.

“The cave that’s going to be open to the public has zero bats in it,” he added.