I’m concerned if I would feel a bat in my knee wide awake.
What do you mean by this? I do not understand the topic so pls. add some clarity.
Sorry for not being clear. I’m asking whether a person who is fully awake would notice or feel a bat landing on their knee or leg. Would the weight, movement, or claws be noticeable?
Welcome to the Forum!
To be clear, I’ll distinguish “feeling” from “noticing” - “feeling” depends on the quality of your nervous system, while “noticing” is more complex involving your state of awareness of your surroundings. From personal experience, I have felt (and noticed) flies, spiders, beetles, and sometimes mosquitos landing on my legs (bare skin), and have felt mice (about the same size as a small bat) through clothing, so I’m pretty sure I would also notice a medium-size bat landing (but have never had the experience to be certain).
Thanks for your answer. What I’m wondering is whether a person who is fully awake would notice a bat landing on their bare skin, such as their knee. Since you mentioned noticing flies, spiders, beetles, and even mice, do you think a bat landing on bare skin would be noticeable in most cases?
I have felt a spider tiptoeing across my forehead. Or a beetle land on my hand. Unless you are wearing thick protective clothing ?
I feel the need to say, if you are in the US, or anywhere rabies is present, and you have possibly been in contact with a bat on your bare skin, please contact a health professional. Let them know what happened and determine if you have had an exposure. Your question is a little cryptic. Bats have exceptionally tiny teeth and if a bat was on bare skin without you being aware, please discuss with a doctor. Let them decide if you had a possible exposure.
That being said, I do not want to cause undue anxiety. It’s just difficult to tell from your limited information if this is what you’re discussing.
I wanted to clarify my situation to see if it changes the advice. I was wide awake in my house when a bat appeared. It was flying around a different area of the room/house initially, and then it was shooed away. I didn’t feel anything, but my anxiety is making me worry: is it possible for a bat to land on my knee while I am completely awake and alert without me noticing?
No, I usally and always wear short pants unless if its a event
While this sounds like something understandably concerning, I think that you are safe. Most animals (besides the odd bugs who like to land wherever) try to avoid humans. And the chances that it accidentally bumped your knee are pretty low. Especially if it was not in the area you were in.
I, personally, have had a bat in my house before, and I remember it flew around the ceiling of one room for a while before entering the next room, where we all found it hanging upside down from a plugged-in extension cord. I put gloves on, put a plastic container over it like you would catch a bug in the house, and took it outside. I have to say, I had not really considered exposure to disease at the time, but I was younger and also very excited.
i’d be surprised if someone didn’t notice a bat on their bare skin
Thank you so much for the clarification! Yes, I think you would absolutely have known if it landed on you if you were wide awake. Like Diana said, I too have noticed the tiniest of insects walking across my skin, our skin is sensitive enough to notice. I wanted to mention the warning because there have been cases of people who woke up and found a bat in their bedroom and/or on their bed and they had no way of knowing if they accidentally rolled over onto it in the night or not.
I hope we have alleviated your anxiety, I understand how our brains like to trick us. I do not thin k you have anything to worry about.
You 100% did the right thing. I would have found it exciting too!
One thing to keep in mind about bats and rabies in the US: less than 1% of bats carry the virus. That number tends to get a bit skewed by the fact that somewhere between 6-10% of the ones turned in for testing test positive, but that’s a factor of selection bias: all of the bats that are turned over for rabies testing are suspected of being sick with something. You’re far more likely to contract leprosy in the US in any given year than you are to contract rabies from a bat bite.
If a bat gets in to the house and is flying normally—allowing for being scared guanoless from finding itself in a big, weirdly echo-y space and chased by shrieking bigthings—it’s probably healthy. It’s also probably young, may be hypothermic if there was a recent rainstorm, and potentially hypoglycemic or dehydrated. If it’s too panicky to fly out an open door on its own, the best thing to do is wait for the bat to perch somewhere, gently gather it up into a double-folded bath towel, and take it outside. I’ve never been bitten, but I’ve heard it described as being chomped by a mouthful of thumbtacks. You’d have to be really deeply asleep to ignore something like that.
Many years ago, I had a non-flying bat as a houseguest for about a week until the wildlife rehabbers could come get it. But that’s a whole 'nother story. 
While we never want to cause undue fear or anxiety over bats and rabies, bats are the animal responsible for the most deaths from rabies in humans in the US. It’s true that less than 1% of bats carry the virus, but the concern is the high number of deaths from rabies from interactions with bats.
a general caveat - we can’t provide medical advice on the forum.
not sure if the bat was in your house for some time or not - but that said, if you didn’t notice a bat on your knee while you were awake, I’d be surprised.
there have been folks who have woken up to find bats in their homes, and due to uncertainty of exposure, have had to follow post-exposure prophylaxis measures.