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Echolocation is a term that describes the way that bats direct their flying, avoid solid objects, and locate food. Bats send out cries, the sound waves of which reflect off of objects in their path. The reflected sound creates an echo that the bats hear. The bats can then figure out where objects (such as trees and insects) are located by detecting the direction that the echo came from.

Humans are unable to hear the bat cry used in echolocation because it has a very high pitch. Pitch refers to how many times a sound wave is produced in a given amount of time. A high pitch means that the sound wave occurs many times in a given period, whereas a low pitch means that the sound wave occurs few times in a given period. The human ear is not capable of perceiving sounds with a very high pitch. Echolocation comes from the Greek word "echo" meaning "sound," and the Latin word "locus" meaning "a place." Put the words together and you have "sound a place."

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