[NatureNS] re bats endangered -- good for other insectivores??

Date: Sun, 07 Jul 2013 12:27:57 -0300
From: "Stephen R. Shaw" <srshaw@Dal.Ca>
To: naturens@chebucto.ns.ca
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Hi Dave,
I think it would be on the unwashed soles of the boots not the clothes  
or armpits, but yours sounds a plausible idea also, though the time at  
sea for a container (2 weeks?) does sounds like a deterrent, as you  
say.  Another possible problem is that I don't recall how far inland  
the originator cave lay inside NY State, but you could counter that  
anyway by guessing that the infected bat got there in several flight  
stages and roosts over several days.

All of the options sound extremely unlikely to happen, but that's  
evolutionary opportunity for you -- if tried often enough, the unusual  
will occasionally happen so that an opportunist can colonize a new  
area, in this case with drastic effect on the local species.
Steve

Quoting David & Alison Webster <dwebster@glinx.com>:

> Hi Steve & All,                                July 7, 2013
>    Because White nose spreads by direct contact I think one can rule  
> out tourists or researchers as carriers that brought a European  
> disease to NA.
>
>    I think the chances of some person becoming cosy with a huddle of  
> bats in Europe, zipping across the Atlantic and then hanging out  
> with some North American bats, all without washing, bathing or  
> changing clothes, is very unlikely.
>
>    The most likely route, in my view, would be by "bat air".  
> Container, cargo and passenger ships are also possible but the long  
> time at sea might be fatal (just guessing).
>
>      All it takes is one crate/container with a hole large enough  
> for a bat to enter, parked outside in Europe some evening, and  
> transfer of that crate while the bat is asleep to a cargo hold. Once  
> in NA it just needs to go through Customs & Immigration, have it's  
> passport stamped and the rest is history.
>
> Yt, Dave Webster, Kentville
>
> ----- Original Message ----- From: "Stephen R. Shaw" <srshaw@Dal.Ca>
> To: <naturens@chebucto.ns.ca>
> Sent: Friday, July 05, 2013 2:59 AM
> Subject: Re: [NatureNS] re bats endangered -- good for other insectivores??
>
>
>> Despite the plaudits so far, I'd extend Jim's polite comments  
>> further  to say that we take the C-H paper version at home, and  
>> found the C-H  bat article in it to be singularly uninformative --  
>> it didn't even  contain info on who to contact if you had the  
>> requested bat sightings.  These occasional nature pieces for the  
>> C-H are a great idea, but the  surprise in this case is that the  
>> consortium of writers that produce  them (which includes David P)  
>> didn't get the local person who actually  works on bats and  
>> therefore knows something about them, to write the  article - Hugh  
>> Broders of SMU.
>>
>> I didn't catch the Andrew Hebda interview so the following may be  
>> superfluous, but what I've picked up just from a couple of local  
>> talks here is that the fungus is genetically identically or almost  
>> so to the European strain. This implies that it was imported  
>> somehow from there  (on some tourist's or researcher's boots?) and  
>> tracked into the single  cave in NY State where the outbreak is  
>> known to have started, and from  which it has since radiated  
>> outwards quickly.  Bats (or some of them)  don't return to the same  
>> roosting site but often disperse to different  roosts each morning.  
>>  This spreads the fungus widely to infect those  in other roosts.   
>> That occurs by direct contact between bats --  uninfected bats kept  
>> in cages right next to infected ones don't catch  it, meaning that  
>> it does not usually behave as an airborne pathogen.   The fungus in  
>> Europe seems to have little current effect on the bats  there,  
>> which from general host-parasite studies is thought to imply  that  
>> the association between the two has been long-term, so the host   
>> bats have eventually become largely immune to the pathogen.   
>> Whether  'long-term' means a few tens of years or 'since the last  
>> ice age' is  unclear, but the jump of one now-less-potent malarial  
>> parasite from  birds to humans has been placed way back, at an  
>> estimated ~12,000  years if memory serves correctly.
>>
>> What's unclear to me but someone here will have the answer, is  
>> whether the disappearing NE American/Canadian bats are the same  
>> species (or subspecies whatever that means) that occur in Europe.   
>> If so, perhaps thought is being given to trying to import some  
>> individuals of the counterpart species, that presumably have  
>> immunity to the fungus and  so might help to regenerate the local  
>> species here?
>>
>> Steve (Halifax)
>> ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
>>
>> Quoting "James W. Wolford" <jimwolford@eastlink.ca>:
>>>> Subject: [ValleyNature] re bats endangered -- good for other  
>>>> insectivores??
>>>>
>>>> Today on CBC Radio News, Andrew Hebda said it might not be long    
>>>> before our little brown bat is extinct, considering the  
>>>> precipitous  decline over the past two winters in the  
>>>> hibernacula.  Thus Andrew  was predicting that, without their  
>>>> night-time enemies, mosquitoes   are liable to get much more  
>>>> abundant and troublesome for us than   usual.
>>>>
>>>> But I wonder if this general insect abundance might actually help  
>>>>   our troubled aerial insectivores a bit (swifts, swallows,    
>>>> nighthawks, flycatchers, others?)?
>>>>
>>>> Hugh or Mark or Andrew or Fred or Don, Mark's great article in  
>>>> Saturday's NovaScotian section (Herald) left out any information  
>>>> on  the history of the fungus (Geomyces destructans) and the bat   
>>>>  populations in Europe.  Is much known about how the bats fared  
>>>> then  and, if they declined hugely like ours, how long it took  
>>>> them to   creep back into present abundance.  I think I have  
>>>> heard or read   that the same fungus now doesn't seem to be  
>>>> affecting the bats much  or at all in the Old World.
>>>>
>>>> Cheers from Jim in Wolfville.


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