MCFly volunteer Sarah Irving learns about bats in one of Manchester’s loveliest parks.

It’s no shock when an outdoor event in Manchester gets rained off. But at least we got to come face-to-face with a pipistrelle,  Britain’s commonest bat;  in the hands of a gloved expert it looked like two inches of quivering, furry energy bursting to take off around the room.

This was the high point of a talk from Simon, an ecologist and member of the South Lancashire Bat Group  hosted by Friends of Platt Fields in Rusholme. We may not have got the promised walk around Platt Fields lake with bat-detecting equipment, since bats don’t come out in the rain (even Mancunian bats). But we did hear how the Daubenton’s,  another bat species, feeds on small insects on the surface of water by scooping them up with its big furry feet.  (see picture!)