Wildlife photographer Ian Redmond filmed the interior of the remote Kitum Cave in western Kenya, home to many creatures including thousands of bats.

Redmond commented after filming in February 2018: "Having spent a cumulative total of 6 months (over several years) living in #KitumCave, studying the famous troglodyte tuskers of Mount Elgon, #Kenya, I am very comfortable around bats."

"What makes these caves extraordinary is that the major force of erosion that created them is elephants, tusking and eating the mineral-rich cave walls.

"The cave floor is carpeted in places with elephant dung, so flies and moths must occasionally find themselves in these crystal palaces."

Bats are not everyone's favourite mammal, but they are amazing. They are also hosts to a number of coronavirus species and are candidates for the source of several zoonotic diseases, including #Covid19, Marburg and Ebola (though direct evidence of bat to human transmission is elusive).
Having spent a cumulative total of 6 months (over several years) living in #KitumCave, studying the famous troglodyte tuskers of Mount Elgon, #Kenya, I am very comfortable around #bats (and as far as I know, haven't picked up any of their parasites or pathogens). My 99th #lockdown video to #BrightenYourDay takes you into the dark zone of Kitum (if that is not a contradiction in terms) to share that experience.
The verdant valleys and forested slopes of Mount Elgon are riddled with caves, most of which have a broadly similar shape - a cul-de-sac extending horizontally into the hillside (sometimes complicated by hillocks of fallen roof and often behind a waterfall). What makes these caves extraordinary is that the major force of erosion that created them is elephants, tusking and eating the mineral-rich cave walls. Many other species use the resulting caves as this video reveals. Rousette's Tongue-clicking #fruitbats roost in the roof, revealed first by a thermal camera and then the lights of a film crew. The camera rises to explore a hollow fossil log, felled by a pyroclastic flow in the late Miocene, and now a tubular hole in the cave roof, lined with needle-like crystals of natrolite, where an optimistic spider has woven a web. The cave floor is carpeted in places with elephant dung, so flies and moths must occasionally find themselves in these crystal palaces.
If this mix of geology and zoology excites you as much as it does me, do take a virtual safari to Mount Elgon National Park, Kenya, via www.vEcotourism.org or in the free VR app vEco Tours, which can be used with or without a VR headset.
Note: What benefit to elephants get? They are tusking in the dark and eating whatever they chisel off the wall, mostly volcanic agglomerate but occasionally bits of crystal. The main salt is Sodium Suphate, so the rock doesn't taste 'salty' as it would with Sodium Chloride, but the release of Sodium ions during digestion satisfies the miners' salt appetite. Interestingly though, Natrolite is in the Zeolite family of minerals, and in Japan there are reports that ground-up zeolites added to cattle feed improves digestion, reduces gas and improves growth rates, so perhaps the eles get an overall tonic as well as a dose of salts!