PORTLAND, Ore. — They’re as much a part of Halloween as costumes, candy, and flickering jack-o’-lanterns. But bats are far from the blood-sucking, disease-ridden bad guys they’ve been made out to be.

She doesn't wear a black, hooded mask and cape and swoop across the sky like a comic book superhero. The nickname acknowledges her expertise in the ways of the small, nocturnal winged mammals. The ...

MOUNT SOLON—What do most people think when they see a bat? It’s usually not good, thanks largely to myth, literature and film that has long portrayed the critter as a blood-sucking menace to be feared ...

Campfire stories describing rabid, blood-sucking bats caught in your hair might be entertaining and frightening, but they are far from the truth. Because of movies and myths, bats are feared as much ...