White Nose Syndrome

[OFG-1]

Wow, white nose syndrome is far worse than the brown nose syndrome I see around work everyday.

[LiteHedded]

Florida Caverns State Park has bat houses all over the place. They even have instructions on how to build them. They aren't difficult. Does Peacock have bats in the area?

I know there are swarms of bats at running springs. and that's not far from pcock

[Marc Bryan]

Maybe we could use some NFSA funds to build some houses at PSSP, Troy, etc....

They cannot be terribly expensive. I believe it would be an excellent return on the investment.

[Squirrel Girl]

I just got the report that yet another cave in Virginia has been discovered to contain WNS.

[Puttzer]

I just got the report that yet another cave in Virginia has been discovered to contain WNS.

So what is it that's killing the bats?

Anyone know the status of the research so far?

[Squirrel Girl]

So what is it that's killing the bats?

Anyone know the status of the research so far?

No one knows what's killing them. The "White Nose" is due to a fungus growing, yes on their snouts, but also on their wings and so on (check the cover shot on the NSS News a month or so ago). The fungus might kill them direction (I don't think that's thought to be true), but it also could be an opportunistic infection. Is it a virus? Is it something related to the environment?

Here's the link to the NSS WNS Info page:
http://www.caves.org/WNS/WNS%20Info.htm

Here's the link to the March 2009 Research Status Report:
http://www.caves.org/WNS/WNS2009research.pdf

Here's the US Fish and Wildlife Service's WNS page:
http://www.fws.gov/northeast/white_nose.html

[crchrds]

The problem with WNS is that nobody knows exactly how it kills bats. There is speculation that the fungus somehow depletes the fat reserves and therefore they wake up from hibernation in search of food. Foraging during the winter is a death wish to any bat. There are little to no insects for them to forage on and many starve to death. WNS is a fungus not a bacteria or virus. Fungus spreads through spores. It is hypothesized that bat to bat may be a main vector, but that humans are helping spread the fungus by walking though the dirt in a cave and then going to other caves without properly decontaminating gear. Currenlty a 10% bleach solution has been touted as the way to decontaminate your gear, however there has been much specualtion about decontaminating life saving gear (rope, climbing harnesses, etc.).

For now the SCCi has closed all of it's caves until a proper investigation of this deadly fungus can be completed. This includes caves that have water in them. Also, the USFWS has asked for dry cavers to stay out of caves in states where WNS has been located and in any adjoining state. This closes a huge section of the US to caving. As we are cave divers, it really does not affect us unless you are a sump diver (which I am).

One thing is for sure, there are hundreds of thousands of bats that have died due to this fungus. Many times they are just performing necropsies on the bats they find.

Here are a couple of additional links for your information.

From Fox News:
http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,487492,00.html

http://wvgazette.com/News/200902210385

Protocols for decontaminating gear:
http://www.fws.gov/northeast/whitenosemessage.html.

A WNS webinar from Feb 20:
http://www.earthfiles.com/news.php?I...ry=Environment


There is a lot of information out there for those concerned.

[Arnold Mesiser]

a REALLY sobering video of how bad this is


http://www.batmanagement.com/wns/wns.html


scroll down 3/4 -left side- Aeolus cave video

[metaldector]

Last time I visited the 'Bats' one was missing! Now there is only two!

[jeandiver]

Last time I visited the 'Bats' one was missing! Now there is only two!

Last time I peeked a couple weeks ago , I believe the 'Bats' population has increased slightly.

Beano