Do you know what a "stobie" pole is?

Unless you live in this small part of the world then you have probably never heard of them.  

They are power line poles made of two steel beams kept apart by a slab of concrete. They are used in this state because white ants would otherwise eat the timber which would be used.  The stobie pole was designed by a Mr James Stobie in 1924.

He designed some other things as well although I nothing about these. My maternal grandparents lived next door to his sister and Mr Stobie apparently spent a good deal of time in my grandfather's workshop. The "new" workshop certainly showed signs of being designed by someone who had designed a steel and concrete pole.

These poles have been the cause of many accidents - or so the drivers of the cars which have hit them will tell you (if they survived to tell the tale). They are also the cause of another problem now. 

They are apparently where the infestation of fruit bats or flying foxes are choosing to roost. Middle Cat tells me that they are getting more and more outages in the evening because the bats land on the poles. The outages may not last that long but they are long enough to cause widespread problems. 

How to solve the problem? There are two solutions. One is the very expensive solution of putting the power underground.They have done this with the new suburbs to the north of the city. It is not likely to happen in the old areas around here. 

The other solution is to get rid of some of the bats. That solution has the tree-huggers up in arms. What?  Why should we get rid of any of those bats? There were around 10,000 before Covid and now there could be as many as 60,000. They are actually a Covid related problem - caused by some things not being done during lock down and more. The pampered darlings of the "green" industry have even been treated to cool showers of water in the heat.

These creatures are the carriers of some of the most serious diseases we have. They are causing economic as well as environmental harm. This is apparently something some of the tree-huggers believe we should just accept. Really? I would much rather the parrots outside my window right now had the apples from the tree in which they are sitting. I do not care for bats.