In Ontario, seven out of eight species of bats are at risk of extinction. Major threats to bat survival include habitat loss, disease, collisions with wind turbines, and human conflict. While addressing these stressors remains a key priority for protecting bats, it is also important to understand how bats respond when these stressors are present in their environment. Given that wild bats have historically been understudied, basic information about their biology is still lacking for many species. Establishing this baseline knowledge under natural conditions is the first step in understanding how environmental stressors may affect them. Your Toronto Zoo, University of Regina, and University of Northern British Columbia recently collaborated on a study to measure the stress-associated hormone, cortisol, in three species of bats living in relatively undisturbed habitats. Researchers measured cortisol from fur samples, which provides a non-invasive measure reflecting longer-term hormone ...