Fw: Your blog and bats

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From: Meril, Rick
To: 'nfascione@batcon.org' <nfascione@batcon.org>
Sent: Mon May 17 18:57:15 2010
Subject: Re: Your blog and bats

Nina.....teriffic of you to contact me like this....I would love to be an honorary member of BATS and would love to post updates that you and your site provide me.........I learned of WNS as this terrifying killer swept through NY and Vermont caves.

Are we to blame through a combination of chemicals, warming temperatures???? I know there are no answers yet but is there any hypotheses that u have heard about that have some "teeth" to their rationale.........your perspective?.........will the 10 percent of the various Bat species that survive pass immunity to WNS onto their offspring........in essence innoculating them and making them immune to this horror?

Many thanks again......I am posting our exchange tonight for others to comment on should they wish to.

Stay in touch and I root for you and colleagues to fin out why the affliction.....and what can be done to mitigate it's deadly impact on our "WINGED FRIENDS OF THE NIGHT".

Rick

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From: Nina Fascione <nfascione@batcon.org>
To: Meril, Rick
Sent: Mon May 17 18:14:19 2010
Subject: Your blog and bats

Hi Rick.

 

Thank you so much for posting information about bats on your blog and for letting me know about it.  White-nose Syndrome (WNS) is a terrifying disease, with nearly 100% mortality rate in many caves.  Unfortunately, we continue to hear more bad news about it – please see below press release that just went out today about gray bats and WNS.

 

I'd love to give you an honorary membership to BCI so you can learn more about us through our BATS magazine.  If you are interested, please provide your address so we can send you that.   Also, if you are interested in receiving electronic notices about bat conservation updates, please let me know and I will add your name to our email list.

 

Thanks again for helping to educate people about bats.

 

Regards,

Nina

 

 

Nina Fascione Executive Director nfascione@batcon.org www.batcon.org www.batcatalog.com      PO Box 162603 Austin, Texas 78716-2603   (512) 327-9721 (512) 327-9724 fax

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Contact: Mylea Bayless

Work: 512 327-9721 x34

Cell: 512 809-9072

 

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

 

 

           

WNS Fungus Hits Endangered Gray Bats

 

A fungus tied to White-nose Syndrome (WNS), the most devastating disease ever faced by North American bats, is now confirmed in endangered gray bats in Missouri. Recovery efforts, especially protecting critical caves used by these bats, have been so successful that the gray bat was being considered for graduation off the list of endangered species. WNS threatens to reverse that success.

 

WNS has swept across the eastern United States, killing more than a million hibernating bats of seven species since it was discovered in a New York cave in February 2006. Mortality rates approaching 100 percent are reported at some sites, and the disease still defies desperate research efforts to find a cure or at least a way to slow the spread.

 

Endangered Indiana bats already are being battered by WNS. So far this year, the disease or the associated fungus have expanded into Tennessee, Maryland and Missouri, and northward into Ontario and Quebec in Canada. Bats across the continent are at imminent risk.

 

Roughly 95 percent of all gray bats hibernate in a handful of caves in Tennessee, Missouri, Arkansas, Kentucky, and Alabama. If WNS decimates these few, major colonies, the species would clearly be in peril.

 

"This news that gray bats are now infected with the White-nose Syndrome fungus is especially tragic for BCI," said Nina Fascione, Executive Director of Bat Conservation International, "because our organization has worked so hard over so many years for the recovery of this important species. We must find a way to stop this disease before extinctions become inevitable."

 

Fascione submitted written testimony to the Senate Interior Appropriations subcommittee last week urging the federal government to commit an additional $5 million for research and management of WNS in 2011. The request was endorsed by nearly 60 other organizations, including the Center for Biological Diversity, Natural Resources Defense Council, Defenders of Wildlife and the National Speleological Society.

 

Bat Conservation International has been a key player in the gray bat's recovery since the organization's founding in 1982. The species, its population collapsing, was listed as endangered in 1976. BCI documented the critical threats were disturbances and loss of caves that met gray bats needs for hibernating in winter and giving birth and raising young in summer.

 

BCI worked with partners such as the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, The Nature Conservancy and the American Cave Conservation Association, to protect critical caves, as by installing bat-friendly gates that keep people out. Gray bat colonies at caves often doubled or tripled in size after gating, and total population grew some 40 percent from 1982, reaching an estimated 2.5 million in 2005.

 

Bat Conservation International (BCI) is devoted to conserving the world's bats and their ecosystems in order to ensure a healthy planet. Founded in 1982, the organization has achieved unprecedented progress by emphasizing sustainable uses of natural resources that benefit both bats and people.