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  • As researchers scramble to unlock the mysteries surrounding a deadly condition affecting bats, white nose syndrome continues its march into the interior of the United States. Photo courtesy www.fws.gov

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April 26, 2010

White nose syndrome marching into U.S.

The Times-Tribune

CORBIN — By Becky Manley / Staff Writer 

As researchers scramble to unlock the mysteries surrounding a deadly condition affecting bats, the disease continues its march into the interior of the United States.

White nose syndrome, originally found in caves in New York during the winter of 2006-2007, is now found in two Canadian provinces and about a dozen states spanning from New Hampshire south to Tennessee. Last week, the Missouri Department of Conservation announced it found the disease in a bat in that state.

It is believed it is just a matter of time before the disease spreads to Kentucky.

The disease, which causes a white growth on bat’s faces and ulcers on their wings and bodies, was discussed during “White Nose Syndrome and the Future of Caving” Thursday at Union College.

The presentation, delivered by five panelists, was part of the college’s Earth Day activities.

Echoing concerns raised since the condition was first detected in the U.S., panelists talked about the vital role bats play in controlling insect populations — including mosquitoes which can transmit debilitating diseases to people. 

Panelist Tim Williams, a biochemist from Northern Kentucky University who is researching geomyces destructans — the fungus believed to be responsible for the disease — said people are in for a “pretty nasty siege” by insects if white nose syndrome continues to spread among bat populations.

When a bat contracts the disease, it can flare up during the winter when the animal hibernates, Williams said. Worsening symptoms may rouse the animal from its sleep, sometimes causing it to leave its shelter for the outdoors, where it either freezes to death or starves.

Experts are concerned that in addition to being transmitted from bat-to-bat, it’s possible people may also be able to transmit fungal spores from one contaminated area to another.

Williams talked about decontamination procedures that can be used to cleanse fungal spores from caving gear.

Some of those procedures as well as other preventative practices — like limiting areas of caves where visitors can go — are also being used at some tourist caves frequented by the general public.

Williams said tourists who visit Mammoth Cave National Park who have visited other caves are asked to go through a simple procedure to remove fungal spores.

“Really, every commercial cave should be doing the same thing,” Williams said.

Williams, who said it is impossible for cavers to detect which caves house infected bats, said it is just a matter of time before the disease is found in Kentucky.

Another panelist, Brooke Slack, a wildlife biologist with Kentucky Department of Fish and Wildlife Resources, said once a bat population is infected, the disease has a mortality rate of over 90 percent.

There are caves where Slack said entire colonies have succumbed to the disease.

“These sites are gone,” Slack said. “The bats are completely gone.”

For more information about caving in Kentucky from the local group Pine Mountain Grotto, visit www.caves.org/grotto/pmg. National caving information can be found at www.caves.org.

More information about white nose syndrome can be found at the U.S. Fish and Wildlife site at www.fws.gov and doing a site search for “white nose syndrome.”

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