Bat Use of an Island off the Coast of Massachusetts

Dowling, Zara; O'Dell, Danielle I.

doi:10.1656/045.025.0302

Cited by 12 publications

(9 citation statements)

References 43 publications

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“…However, in the Appalachian Plateau of West Virginia and eastern Ohio, anecdotal evidence suggests some residual populations of bats normally affected by WNS persist perhaps due to lower exposure to WNS in pre-law mines than would occur in karst formation caves. Analogous to persistence being reported on the Coastal Plain to the east where bats overwinter in forests or aberrant hibernacula (Grider et al 2016;Dowling and O'Dell 2018), the same is observed for northern long-eared and Indiana bats overwintering in small legacy coal adits or emergent rock features on pre-law mines in the Appalachian Plateau (De La Cruz and Schroder 2015). These legacy mines may minimize other bat species' exposure to WNS-vectoring little brown bats, may be utilized only by local bats, and/or provide unsuitable substrates (i.e., substrate pH < 5) for Pseudogymnoascus destructans, persistence and growth (Wilder et al 2011;Raudabaugh and Miller 2013).…”

Section: Bat Hibernaculasupporting

confidence: 73%

Terrestrial Wildlife in the Post-mined Appalachian Landscape: Status and Opportunities

Lituma

Cox

Spear³

et al. 2020

Appalachia's Coal-Mined Landscapes

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Coal mining is an anthropogenic stressor that has impacted terrestrial and semi-aquatic wildlife in the Appalachian Plateau since European settlement. Creation of grassland and early-successional habitats resulting from mining in a forested landscape has resulted in novel, non-analog habitat conditions. Depending on the taxa, the extent of mining on the landscape, and reclamation practices, effects have ranged across a gradient of negative to positive. Forest-obligate species such as woodland salamanders and forest-interior birds or those that depend on aquatic systems in their life cycle have been most impacted. Others, such as grassland and early-successional bird species have responded favorably. Some bat species, as an unintended consequence, use legacy deep mines as winter hibernacula in a region with limited karst geology. Recolonization of impacted wildlife often depends on life strategies and species' vagility, but also on altered or arrested successional processes on the post-surface mine landscape. Many wildlife species will benefit from Forest Reclamation Approach practices going forward. In the future, managers will be faced with decisions about reforestation versus maintaining open habitats depending on the conservation need of species. Lastly, the post-mined landscape currently is the focal point for a regional effort to restore elk (Cervus canadensis) in the Appalachians.

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Section: Bat Hibernaculasupporting

confidence: 73%

Terrestrial Wildlife in the Post-mined Appalachian Landscape: Status and Opportunities

Lituma

Cox

Spear³

et al. 2020

Appalachia's Coal-Mined Landscapes

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“…For example, growth rates are still negative for many affected M. sodalis populations 117,141 . Coastal refugia have been implicated in the persistence of a few remnant M. septentrionalis 142 , although more research is needed to understand whether bats are actually surviving P. destructans infections in these habitats. Multiple studies have investigated the drivers of bat survival with WNS, mainly focusing on M. lucifugus or Eurasian bat species, spanning general ( Fig.…”

Section: Host Persistencementioning

confidence: 99%

Ecology and impacts of white-nose syndrome on bats

2021

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White-nose syndrome (WNS) is a fungal disease in bats and one of the most devastating infectious disease outbreaks in wild mammals to emerge over the past century 1-15. WNS was first detected in 2007 by biologists who discovered an abnormal mortality event at a cave in Albany County, New York (NY), USA, while conducting routine bat population monitoring surveys 16. Bats that were still alive were covered in a white fungus, which was most noticeable on their muzzles, ears and wings, thus leading to the disease being named WNS 17,18. Following this discovery, inspection of nearby hibernation sites (hibernacula) led to similar findings and further examination of photos collected from previous winter surveys revealed that bats at another nearby site had visible signs of infection with the fungus in the winter of 2005-2006. Thus, the earliest evidence of this disease in North America is on 16 February 2006 in Howes Cave, NY 17. Histological examination of dead and dying bats later identified the likely causative agent as Geomyces destructans 19 , a novel fungus that was unknown to science before its discovery in North America 17. Based on DNA sequence data from other Geomyces spp. and related fungi, G. destructans was reclassified as Pseudogymnoascus destructans 16,17,20 in 2013. P. destructans is a multi-host psychrophilic ascomycete 20 in the order Onygenales, which contains many other pathogenic and environmentally resilient fungi. Molecular evidence suggests that P. destructans has evolved with Eurasian bat communities, with which it has coexisted for millenia 21,22 , to become a specialist pathogen that relies primarily on living bat tissue for growth and replication 22-24. The investment in parasitic traits has led to physiological and ecological trade-offs 22-26 , which make P. destructans both reliant on but also well adapted to infecting the epidermal tissue of hibernating bats during the winter 26,27. While bat communities across Eurasia experience greatly reduced WNS disease severity with no evidence of mass mortality 28,29 , naive host communities in North America experienced unprecedented population declines 1-15 on first exposure to this virulent pathogen 26,27. Routine monitoring and retrospective photo documentation of bat populations enabled biologists to estimate the timing of P. destructans' introduction to North America with some certainty, making this disease emergence unique among other wildlife diseases. Early detection enabled the spread of P. destructans across North America to be tracked and the impacts of the pathogen on hosts to be accurately assessed. Building on this information, the first decade of WNS research has led to considerable advances in the understanding of the closely tied interactions between P. destructans and its hosts compared with other emerging wildlife diseases over similar timescales 30,31. In this Review, we describe the origins, distribution, seasonal life history, pathogenesis, and the impacts and persistence of bats with P. destructans across the globe. Finally, we...

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“…The low resolution of data points in central and eastern Virginia may have limited our WNS impact interpolation, thus limiting the conclusions. However, coastal populations of northern longeared bats in nearby northeastern North Carolina (Grider et al 2016) and Massachusetts (Dowling and O'Dell 2018) persist despite documented WNS in those states. Without natural hibernacula in close proximity, these surviving coastal bats overwinter in houses (Dowling and O'Dell 2018) and trees with only periodic bouts of torpor, leave roosts to forage, and have the ability to groom (Hawkins et al 2017), limiting WNS exposure and impact.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…However, coastal populations of northern longeared bats in nearby northeastern North Carolina (Grider et al 2016) and Massachusetts (Dowling and O'Dell 2018) persist despite documented WNS in those states. Without natural hibernacula in close proximity, these surviving coastal bats overwinter in houses (Dowling and O'Dell 2018) and trees with only periodic bouts of torpor, leave roosts to forage, and have the ability to groom (Hawkins et al 2017), limiting WNS exposure and impact. As a result, the WNS impact-years metric may not be as relevant in coastal areas where northern long-eared bats may use alternative over-wintering strategies.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

White‐nose Syndrome and Environmental Correlates to Landscape‐Scale Bat Presence

Barr

Silvis

Armstrong

et al. 2021

Wildlife Society Bulletin

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Over the past 13 years, White-nose Syndrome (WNS) has caused North American bat population declines and shifted community structure towards species less or unaffected by the disease. Mistnetting, acoustic surveys, and cave count data have been used to document changes in bat presence and activity through site-specific, pre-and post-WNS studies. Management and survey guidance often must be applied at a combined landscape and site-specific scale. Our objective was to explore the relationships among WNS impact, influence of available hibernacula, and environmental factors for the nightly presence of 3 WNS-affected bats: the Indiana bat (Myotis sodalis), northern long-eared bat (M. septentrionalis), and big brown bat (Eptesicus fuscus). We used recordings from 10 acoustic monitoring study areas, each with 3 survey locations across the states of Virginia, West Virginia, Ohio and Kentucky to assess changes in nightly bat presence during the summer of 2017. There were significant positive and negative correlates of broad land-cover categories for presence of all 3 bat species. Our findings also corroborated trends in abundance and distribution patterns found in prior, smaller-scale studies, supporting the relevance of land cover categories in a large-scale acoustic monitoring framework. We observed a negative association between WNS impact-years and nightly northern long-eared bat presence, but low occurrence and patchy distribution reduced our ability to infer strong relationships. Big brown bat presence showed a significant positive relationship with WNS occurrence on the landscape, providing evidence that big brown bats are maintaining populations after years of exposure. Indiana bats were the least-documented species, limiting the strength of our conclusions, but we did observe significant temporal patterns in nightly presence, with higher probabilities of presence earlier in the summer. Our results show the potential efficacy of using a WNS impact metric to predict summer bat presence, inform current U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service acoustic monitoring guidelines, and highlight which environmental variables are relevant for large-scale acoustic monitoring.

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Bat Use of an Island off the Coast of Massachusetts

Cited by 12 publications

References 43 publications

Terrestrial Wildlife in the Post-mined Appalachian Landscape: Status and Opportunities

Terrestrial Wildlife in the Post-mined Appalachian Landscape: Status and Opportunities

Ecology and impacts of white-nose syndrome on bats

White‐nose Syndrome and Environmental Correlates to Landscape‐Scale Bat Presence

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