Distribution and activity of bats at local and landscape scales within a rural–urban gradient

Abstract

We examined the relationship between bat species activity and composition and the extent of forest cover and urbanization in and adjacent to 11 U.S. using mist nets, harp traps, acoustical detectors, and visual observations in a variety of habitats. Our efforts included 363 trap nights across 74 sites along with acoustical sampling at 362 sites. We captured 383 bats and identified 6,380 echolocation passes of 6 species. Both overall and species-specific activities were affected more by forest fragmentation within parks than by urbanization adjacent to parks. With an ability to exploit anthropogenic structures for day-roosts, big brown bats (Eptesicus fuscus) were the most ubiquitous and probably the most abundant species in NCR Parks, particularly in forested, urban parks. Northern myotis (Myotis septentrionalis), and to a lesser extent, little brown myotis (Myotis lucifugus) were more prevalent in forested, rural parks of the Ridge and Valley and Blue Ridge than in eastern, less forested urban parks of the Piedmont and Coastal Plain physiographic provinces. Retention of larger, residual forest tracts and dayroosting habitat (i.e., trees and snags) would be beneficial to most species, as urban expansion continues throughout the region.

Urbanization and the abundance and diversity of Prairie bats

“…Letters above columns represent significant differences among zones (within a bat category), and numbers are total passes in each zone. Note that proportions may not sum to one L. borealis was omitted from the analysis, and that Epfu/Lano refers to the combined E. fuscus/ L. noctivagans bat category recent studies (Johnson et al 2008;Loeb et al 2009) combined acoustic and capture data, as recommended because of the different biases of each technique (Kunz et al 2009). Other studies (e.g., Gaisler et al 1998;Gehrt and Chelsvig 2003;Duchamp and Swihart 2008) used only one data source.…”

Bats and Water: Anthropogenic Alterations Threaten Global Bat Populations

“…Although not the scope of this chapter, it is important to mention that for bats, wetlands provide critical foraging habitat (Johnson et al 2008;Rainey et al 2006) with absolute area and connectivity of wetlands being important components for foraging (Lookingbill et al 2010).…”

Declines in summer bat activity in central New England 4 years following the initial detection of white-nose syndrome

“…Surveys were conducted only when no precipitation was forecast for the evening. I identified bat call sequences using a key based on diagnostic call parameters (see ''Methods'' in Menzel et al 2002;Johnson et al 2008). …”