Way down yonder in the Florida Keys, in a town called Perky that no longer exists because even the post office said “Nope,” a man once looked at a cloud of mosquitoes so thick you could slap the air and kill fifty, and said, “You know what’ll fix this? Bats.”
This is a true story.
Meet Mr. Perky, the Man, the Myth, the Mosquito Magnet
Back in the 1920s, a fella named Richter Clyde Perky (because regular names just wouldn’t do in this tale) bought himself a big chunk of swampland with the dream of turning it into a luxury fishing resort. His grand vision included a casino, a hotel, and rich folks in fancy clothes not slapping themselves silly all day. Problem was, the mosquitoes in Sugarloaf Key were so bad they could carry off small pets and children. You’d step outside and hear a hum like a chainsaw church choir.
Now, where a normal man might have just sold the land and moved to somewhere with less blood loss, Perky doubled down. He found himself a book called “Bats, Mosquitoes, and Dollars” written by a bat-obsessed doctor from Texas named Charles A. R. Campbell. This doc claimed bats were nature’s bug zappers and could take care of the skeeter problem right quick.
Perky read that, rubbed his hands together, and said, “Well, shoot, we’re buildin’ us a bat tower.”
How to Build the World’s Most Useless Bat Hotel
Perky reached out to Doc Campbell, who sent him blueprints for a big ol’ wooden tower shaped kinda like a church steeple mated with a grain silo. The thing had slats for bats to roost in, a special poop chute, and even a guano collector at the bottom in case Perky wanted to go into the bat-fertilizer business. That's right. Not only did he expect bats to move in, he figured he’d make a side hustle selling their droppings. Ambition, thy name is Perky.
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| Perky Bat Tower, Airport Road, Key West, Monroe County, FL Library of Congress |
The good doctor swore that if the tower was built just right, and if Perky used his secret bat bait, those little flying mammals would show up, settle in, and chow down on every mosquito from Miami to Havana.
The bait? I wish I was making this up. It was a wooden crate full of bat poop and what one eyewitness described as “ground-up bat lady parts.” Yes sir. This man opened a box of guano and pheromones so vile it probably made the mosquitoes gag.
According to Perky’s construction supervisor, the stench that wafted out of the opened bait box was like “nothing else on Earth.” He dryly remarked that a smell like that “ought to attract something.”
They slathered that funk all over the tower, stood back, and waited for the bats to arrive.
And they waited.
And waited.
Spoiler Alert: Ain’t No Bats
No bats came. Not a one. The mosquitoes laughed in Perky’s face and got even bolder.
So what does a man do when his bug-busting plan doesn’t work? Well, naturally, he orders bats through the mail. I don’t know how you ship bats, but apparently Perky did. He got two crates of Cuban bats, opened ‘em up near the tower, and let ‘em loose.
And y’all, those bats took off like they’d been shot out of a cannon. They never even slowed down to look at the tower. They flew off into the sunset, probably yelling, “Ain’t no way we livin’ in that stank wooden nightmare.”
Perky even tried to get another batch of the magic bait, but the doc had gone and died, taking his recipe with him. The only thing Perky was left with was an empty tower, a nasty smell, and a mosquito population that was probably bigger than when he started.
Strange and Amusing Footnotes of the Bat Tower Story
- The Plaque of Optimism: Perky was so sure this crazy idea would work that he nailed a plaque to the tower dedicating it “to good health.” That’s like putting a ribbon on a trash fire. The mosquitoes were probably chuckling as they read it.
- Bat Bait from Hell: The secret bait smelled like someone had deep-fried roadkill in a port-a-potty. It had guano, female bat bits, and who knows what else. What it attracted was regret.
- If You Build It, They Won’t Come: Not only did no bats ever show up, but the ones Perky bought hit the Florida sky like their tails were on fire and never looked back. You know it's bad when an animal that sleeps upside down in caves says, “Nah, I got standards.”
- Local Laughter and Legends: Folks took to calling the whole thing “Perky’s Folly,” and they weren’t wrong. Some people even say the Florida Skunk Ape (our swampy version of Bigfoot) shook the tower one night and scared off the bats for good. Honestly, I’d believe it.
- The Accidental Birdhouse: Years later, ospreys took over the top of the tower. Bats wouldn’t touch it, but fish-hawks apparently thought it was the penthouse suite. Meanwhile, the tower sat in the middle of a mosquito swamp. That’s what we call dramatic irony, folks.
What’s Left of This Bat-Brained Dream?
The tower stood there like a stubborn drunk uncle at a family reunion. Weathered, slightly crooked, and refusing to leave. Hurricanes came and went, but the Bat Tower stayed standing, almost out of spite.
Until 2017. That’s when Hurricane Irma finally took it down for good. Flattened it like a pancake.
But the legend lives on. Perky’s Bat Tower still shows up in books, blogs, and barstool conversations as a shining example of what happens when optimism runs face-first into reality. It’s a story of one man, one bad idea, and a tower full of guano-scented dreams.
And that, my friends, is why you don’t fight mosquitoes with bat voodoo and a bucket of stink.
