I was reflecting on why it makes me smile so much - apart from bringing back fond memories of childhood holidays on the coast before bat forests were replaced with housing developments.

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I love the fact that no matter how outraged some people get about them, there is nothing that can be done to 'move them on' - other than cut down the trees and destroy the very thing we are trying to preserve.

I love the fact that it feels like a little win for nature. In a rare act of rebellion, finally, wonderfully, there is an animal that won't do as we want and just go away.

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I love the fact that Greening Bathurst advised Bathurst Regional Council not to remove willows along the river that used to be their roosting place, with the assertion that "if you remove them from the river, they might just end up somewhere that you don't want them!".

Animal behaviour is uncertain, so it's nice to be right every now and then.

We humans have destroyed so much habitat with our machines and chemicals and taken up so much of the Earth with more of us and our animals that just 3.5 per cent of the world's land-based vertebrate animals are wild. Let that sink in. No wonder we're in trouble.

Unfortunately, we've kept 'getting away with it' to date, but little things like flying foxes and COVID remind us that we are actually part of the natural systems our race seems intent on destroying.

While these seem like the big global and systemic problems that they are, we can start locally.

In Bathurst, we could start investing in our natural infrastructure to the same extent that we invest in concrete and steel.

We could support our council to start spending some serious money on establishing a forest along the Wambool River from Chifley Dam to Freemantle.

We could support private landholders to make changes on their properties that enhance biodiversity and provide ecological benefits to us all.

And in the meantime, we can take some joy from these wonderful animals.