Hunting News

WNS remains serious threat to Arkansas bats

WNS remains serious threat to Arkansas bats

By Arkansas Game and Fish Commission

Blake Sasse, nongame mammal program coordinator for the Game and Fish Commission, updated Commissioners at the November meeting on the status of white-nose syndrome, a disease that is killing bats by the millions in the U.S.

“You hear about CWD with deer, and we’re all concerned with it, but I’m equally concerned about WNS in our bats,” according to Sasse, who explained the disease is a fungus that grows on the bats during hibernation and causes them to wake prematurely.

As insect-eaters, bats save the agricultural industry millions of dollars in insect damage each year, as they remove some of the pests that plague certain crops. They also eat many other pests and insects that can be vectors for disease, such as mosquitoes.

“Our bats are insect eaters, and they hibernate during winter because of the lack of insects at that time of year,” Sasse said. “Waking up raises their metabolism and causes them to burn fat reserves they have for winter. They essentially starve to death as a result.”

Sasse said the fungus is widespread in Europe and Asia, but bats in those regions have adapted to it. Much like any nonnative species, the fungus has done an extreme amount of damage to bat populations in the U.S. since its arrival.

“Ninety-nine percent of northern long-eared bat populations have been killed because of this disease,” Sasse said. “They once were about as common as a opossum in New England; now they are listed in the Federal Endangered Species Act.”

Sasse said some populations of little brown bats have seen a leveling off of the decline from WNS, but the damage to those populations had already been as high as 90 percent mortality before that occurred.

“We don’t know if those populations will have enough individuals left to recover,” Sasse said.

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