start a flat world
make an area of stone or other valid bat spawning blocks
cover it with snow
set time to midnight
Bats are mainly intended to spawn in caves or dark overhangs and shouldn’t spawn on the surface. I believe what’s happening is that the game is checking if a stone block has sky access and it’s seeing the snow layer as blocking the sky so it allows bats to spawn on the stone. I don’t believe this is intended behavior and should not spawn on the surface like this.
Comments 3
Thank you for your report!
We suspect that this does not occur in the latest version of Minecraft.
Is this issue present in the latest version of Minecraft?
This issue is being temporarily resolved as Awaiting Response. Once the requested information has been delivered, the report will be reopened automatically.
Quick Links:
📓 Bug Tracker Guidelines – 💬 Community Support – 📧 Mojang Support (Technical Issues) – 📧 Microsoft Support (Account Issues)
📓 Project Summary – ✍️ Feedback and Suggestions – 📖 Game Wiki
This appears to have been fixed in Snapshot 25w44a but it was not mentioned in the patch notes. The only mention of bats was this line:
”Bats no longer spawn more frequently and in higher light levels between October 20 and November 3”
Which might have been related but I am pretty sure was not the cause of this bug but maybe?