PRESENT POSITIONS

• Research Fellow, Section of Integrated Biology, University of Texas (2011- present).

• Founder & Executive Director, Merlin Tuttle’s Bat Conservation, Inc. (2014-present).

PAST POSITIONS

• Honorary Ambassador, Year of the Bat Campaign, United Nations Environment Program, the Convention on the Conservation of Migratory Species of Wild Animals the Agreement on the Conservation of Populations of European Bats (2010 – 2012)

• Member, Endangered Species Recovery Team for Indiana Bats and Gray Bats, U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service (1980 – 2012)

• Honorary Consultant, Chiroptera Specialist Group, International Union for Conservation of Nature and Natural Resources (1978 – present)

• Founder and President, Bat Conservation International, Inc., Austin, Texas (1982 – 2009)

• Curator of Mammals, Milwaukee Public Museum, Milwaukee, Wisconsin (1975 – 1986)

• Visiting Scholar, Zoology Department, University of Texas, Austin, Texas (1986 – 1987)

• Adjunct Associate Professor, Zoology Department, University of Wisconsin, Milwaukee, Wisconsin (1979 – 1986)

• Co-Director, Smithsonian Venezuelan Project, Venezuela (1965 – 1967)

ACCOMPLISHMENTS SUMMARY

Merlin Tuttle is an ecologist, wildlife photographer, and conservationist who has studied bats and championed their preservation for 65 years and continues a full-time schedule.

He is globally known through his scientific discoveries, media appearances, popular articles, and photographs of bats. His work has been featured in expositions from Harvard University to the British Museum and in numerous feature articles that include the Wall Street Journal, The New Yorker and National Geographic.

He founded Bat Conservation International (BCI), an organization devoted to research, education and conservation of bats, in 1982. Under his leadership BCI emphasized broad collaboration that balanced both human and wildlife needs and became a model for positive solutions to conservation challenges. Against all odds, BCI grew rapidly. When Tuttle retired in 2009 from nearly 30 years of service as its Executive Director, BCI employed 32 biologists, educators, and administrators, supported by 11,000 members in 60 countries. BCI gained permanent protection for many of the world’s largest remaining bat populations, sponsored research to document the vital ecological and economic roles of bats, trained hundreds of wildlife managers in bat research and conservation techniques, and vastly improved the public’s perception of bats.

He founded Merlin Tuttle’s Bat Conservation (www.MerlinTuttle.org) in 2014 in support of his many continuing conservation activities, entirely independent of his original organization.

AWARDS

In 1986, Dr. Tuttle’s research accomplishments were recognized through the Gerrit S. Miller, Jr. Award, the highest international honor conferred by colleagues in the field of chiropteran biology. In 1991, he received The Society for Conservation Biology’s Distinguished Achievement Award, honoring his accomplishments in founding Bat Conservation International. In 1997, he received both the National Fish and Wildlife Foundation’s Chuck Yeager Award and the Chevron/Times Mirror Magazine’s Conservation Award. In 1999, he was honored by United for Conservation in Mexico and won the $10,000 grand prize in the country’s first nature photography contest. Dr. Tuttle also received the National Wildlife Federation’s prestigious National Conservation Achievement Award for 2001. In 2002, The U.S. Postal Service featured four of Dr. Tuttle’s photographs in a commemorative stamp series. In 2003, Dr. Tuttle received the Margaret Douglas Medal for notable service to conservation education from The Garden Club of America. In 2007 he received a U.S. Congressional Award on behalf of his achievements through Bat Conservation International, and in 2011 the North American Society for Bat Research honored him with a Life Membership. In 2015 he received an honorary Doctor of Science degree from Andrews University. In 2021, Steve Adler, Mayor of the City of Austin, Texas officially proclaimed August 26th as Merlin Tuttle Day, in honor of Dr. Tuttle’s success saving the city’s now world-famous bats. In 2022, Austin non-profit, Family Eldercare, honored Tuttle as one of their “80 Over 80” most impactful people, and that same year, he was commemorated as one of Austin’s RecognizeGood.org Legendary Volunteers.

PUBLICATIONS

Dr. Tuttle has authored 57 research publications and numerous popular articles. His America’s Neighborhood Bats book, and the Bat House Builder’s Handbook ranked among the University of Texas Press’ best sellers. His book, The Secret Lives of Bats: My Adventures with the World’s Most Misunderstood Mammals, was released by Houghton, Mifflin Harcourt Publishing on October 20, 2015. It was immediately selected by Amazon as one of its 10 Best Books of the month in its non-fiction category and received numerous outstanding reviews, including by The Wall Street Journal, The New Yorker, National Geographic Book Talk, Nature and The Huffington Post. Tuttle served as science editor and sole photographer for BATS: an illustrated guide to all species, a 400-page book published by Smithsonian Books in North America and internationally by Ivy Press in London. It was released on April 9, 2019. The American version sold its first print run of over 5,000 copies in just three months. It also received high accolades from the science journal Nature and a prestigious Star Award from the Library Journal. Dr. Tuttle co-authored The Bat House Guide, an 80-page book published by Greenleaf Book Group Press on November 8, 2022. It has consistently received top ratings by readers on Amazon, NetGalley, Goodreads and Barnes and Noble.

LECTURES

Dr. Tuttle has been invited to speak in many of the world’s most prestigious lecture halls. He has given hundreds of major public lectures and research seminars, including at: Harvard, Princeton, Yale and Cornell Universities; the American Museum of Natural History, The Los Angeles County Natural History Museum, the Field Museum, the Shedd Aquarium, the British Museum, the Hong Kong Wetlands Park, South Africa’s Durban Natural Science Museum, the National Museum of Natural Science in Taiwan and the Smithsonian Institution, also at Sydney, Australia’s Taronga Zoo, the U.S. National Zoo, and the Brookfield Zoo; the Chautauqua Institute and the National Geographic Society Headquarters. He provided the keynote address at the 2010 International Bat Research Conference held in the Czech Republic and at the 2014 annual meeting of Discover America held in Gatlinburg, Tennessee. He also was a plenary speaker at the 2015 annual meeting of the Association of Tropical Biology and Conservation in Phnom Penh, Cambodia, attended by representatives from 22 nations. He additionally provided the keynote address at the 46th Annual Research Symposium of the North American Society for Bat Research held in 2016 in San Antonio, Texas. In 2017, he provided keynote addresses for annual meetings of six national organizations from the United States to Brazil and Chile. In 2018, he provided the keynote address for the 72nd Cape May Fall Festival in New Jersey and a lead-off introduction to vampire control issues at the annual meeting of the Wildlife Disease Association in Florida. Additional appearances ranged from The Ladybird Johnson Wildflower Center in Texas to the Milwaukee Public Museum in Wisconsin. In 2021, Tuttle presented a four-hour workshop at the National Cave and Karst Management Symposium and spoke to members of The Wildlife Society.

In 2022, Tuttle gave a lecture tour in South Africa, speaking at a meeting of the South African Macadamia Association, and to graduate students and professors at Peter’s Mountain Bat Lab-Afromontane Research Unit at the University of the Free State-QwaQwa Campus. Tuttle also presented and discussed options for further protecting the Congress Avenue Bridge Bat Colony in Austin, Texas at the October 10th, 2022 meeting of the Austin Animal Advisory Commission, where his recommendations passed unanimously. Additionally in 2022, Tuttle gave multiple lectures at Merlin Tuttle’s Bat Conservation’s (MTBC) Join the Nightlife workshop, a recorded lecture titled, 50 Years of Bat Conservation in America: Then and Now for the North American Society for Bat Research (NASBR), and several workshops in Zambia’s Kasanka National Park.

In 2023 and 2024, Tuttle gave a TEDxUTAustin talk, participated on a SXSW panel, was the Distinguished Lecturer at the Southeastern Cave Conservancy (SCCi), presented The Secret Lives of Bats before a sold-out crowd at the Aquarium of the Pacific, and lectured at workshops from Texas and Ohio to Costa Rica, Mozambique, Thailand and Cuba.

In March 2025, the Adventurers’ Club of Los Angeles streamed a live interview with Tuttle titled, Adventures of a Real Batman with Dr. Merlin Tuttle, and Hollywood actor and producer, Adrian Grenier, posted his interview with Tuttle, The Beauty of Bats with Merlin Tuttle.

SELECTED TELEVISION AND RADIO APPEARANCES

• In 1984, Tuttle’s conservation efforts were featured in a widely aired National Geographic Television special, titled “Merlin’s Bats”.

• In 1985, Tuttle’s research was featured in the BBC Special, The Bat That Cracked the Frog Code, which aired throughout Europe and the U.S.

• In 1990, Tuttle and his conservation efforts were featured in the Survival Anglia production, The Secret World of Bats, which premiered on CBS television in the U.S. and subsequently aired in more than 100 additional countries.  Dr. Tuttle was the Scientific Advisor who planned and participated in this award-winning documentary that continues to air on cable television shows such as the Discovery Channel and Animal Planet.

• In 2006, Tuttle’s lifelong conservation successes were featured in Merlin Tuttle, Guardian Angel of Bats, part of the Mona Lisa & Mandarava Productions, “Heroes of Nature” television series which aired throughout Europe.

• Tuttle’s  other TV appearances include ABC’s Good Morning America, and World News Tonight; NBC’s Today Show, Dateline, and David Letterman Show; CBS’s Evening News; PBS’s Charlie Rose Show; the Discovery Channel, National Geographic Explorer, National Public Radio and Voice of America, among many other television and radio interviews worldwide.

• Tuttle also has appeared on National Public Radio, and Voice of America, among many other television and radio interviews worldwide including a dozen in 2015.

• Tuttle’s interview on Bird Calls Radio aired in 50 states and 108 countries, and his Austin bat story was featured on Chicago PBS station’s Urban Wildlife program in 2018.

• Tuttle provided one radio, four television and three podcast interviews in 2019, including two one-hour-long Ologies podcasts with Ali Ward.

• Tuttle reached large national and international audiences through nine webinars and six podcasts and his conservation efforts were featured in a 1.5-hour French television documentary in 2020.

• In 2021, Tuttle appeared on several podcasts, including Science World, Just Between Us, 99% Invisible, and Backyard Bounty. And a single YouTube video by Ze Frank, promoting Tuttle’s efforts on behalf of bats, reached over a million viewers. Another video produced in 2021 for use at Inner Space Cavern, a Texas tour cave, is reaching more than 300,000 visitors annually. Dr. Tuttle’s interview with Advanced Science News was posted in November 2021.

• In 2022, Tuttle was featured in the short film, “The world’s largest mammal migration at Kasanka National Park, Zambia,” which illustrates the importance of the parks’ bats. Tuttle additionally appeared in two podcasts and four digitally-posted articles.

• Tuttle reached his largest audience ever in 2023 and 2024, appearing on The Joe Rogan Experience, Spectrum News 1, I Live Here I Give Here, Nature Guys, Nocturne, and over 20 other speaking engagements. The total reached was approximately 100 million in more than 70 countries.

FEATURE ARTICLES

Tuttle’s accomplishments have been featured in most of the world’s major newspapers and magazines, including National Geographic, Smithsonian, Modern Maturity, The New Yorker, Time, People, Geo, Reader’s Digest and Stern magazines and most of the major metropolitan newspapers of the U.S. including the New York Times, Wall Street Journal, Los Angeles Times, Miami Herald, Chicago Tribune, Houston Chronicle, and Washington Post.  International newspaper articles include the China Morning Post, Indonesian Times, Sydney Morning Herald, London Times, and many others. He also was one of 40 scientists featured in the 2012 book, Wildlife Heroes by Julie Scardina and Jeff Flocken.

PHOTOGRAPHS

Thousands of publications, exhibits, and websites of a wide variety worldwide have featured Dr. Tuttle’s photographs.  These include five National Geographic articles, more than a dozen National Geographic Society books and other magazines, and inclusion in their prestigious publication, 100 Best Pictures.  His photographs in “Masters of the Night: The True Story of Bats” traveling exhibit have helped educate more than two million people in a decade of touring the United States, Canada, Mexico and Europe. A special 2002 commemorative stamp series by the U.S. Postal Service featured Tuttle’s photographs, and Digital Photographer magazine featured Tuttle’s work in its special issue—The best wildlife photographers of the world named by DP magazine in the year 2007. In 2011, his bat photographs were featured in a major exhibit at the Hong Kong Wetlands Park, and his article featuring how flowering plants have adapted to bat echolocation appeared in the March 2014 issue of National Geographic. In 2021, Tuttle’s photos were used in Klaus Richarz’s German-language book, Nachtflug; an exhibit at the El Yunque National Forest Center in Puerto Rico; an exhibit titled, Bats, between Myth and Reality at the Museum of Jade and Pre-Columbian Culture of Costa Rica; and, the Amazing Pollinators touring exhibit, which received a Thea Award for outstanding achievement. In 2022, Tuttle’s photographs appeared in Sheherazade Sheherazade’s, TEDx Jakarta, “Why the Forest’s Diversity is More Than Just Trees;” the children’s book, Flore Alors!; and the My Modern Met article, “Sweet Bat Portraits Dispel Stereotypes of these Incredibly Important Mammals.” Tuttle’s photos were used to produce artwork of bats in the book, “Pocket Guide to the Mammals of Costa Rica,” by Fiona A. Reid and Gianfranco Gómez Zamora released in November 2022. The March 2023 – December 2025 Smithsonian exhibit, Lights Out, features Tuttle’s photos.

Since 2010, Dr. Tuttle has taken more than 50,000 new images of bats in Brunei, Bulgaria, Cambodia, Costa Rica, Hong Kong, Cuba, Ecuador, Mexico, Mozambique, Panama, South Africa, Taiwan, Thailand, Trinidad, and the U.S.

Last revised 3/17/25