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Fungus on Track to Extinguish Bats in Northeast

A research team organized by Thomas Kunz of Boston University has concluded in a new paper that a common, beneficial bat species is likely to be completely wiped out across much of the Northeastern United States within 20 years due to a spreading fungal infection. The basics are laid out in the news section of the journal Science, which is also publishing the research paper. The news report mentions that bat biologists suggest landowners can boost bats’ prospects by erecting bat houses.

I sent some questions about the fungal peril to North American bats to Winifred Frick, one of the paper’s authors and a National Science Foundation bioinformatics fellow at Boston University and the University of California, Santa Cruz. Here’s our exchange, with a bit of editing to eliminate e-mail shorthand:


My focus is a bit “meta” given the broad focus of the blog on trends as humans head toward people population and appetites. One issue is the “Waring blender” impact of humans on disease and ecosystems, moving pythons to everglades, facilitating viral mashups between people, poultry and pigs, AND moving pathogens around. I noted the evidence for a European origin for the fungus attacking little brown myotis bats. How established is that?


Right now it is safe to say that the fungus being introduced from Europe is a plausible hypothesis. The parts of the genome that have been sequenced show that the Gd fungus here in North America is genetically identical to that found in Europe. There is one paper already published [S. J. Puechmaille et al., Emerg. Infect. Dis. 16, 290 (2010)] which reports that Gd was found on a single bat in France and another In Press (Wibbelt et al.) that shows a wider distribution of Gd on several hibernating bat species in Europe. We don’t see other signs of the syndrome in Europe — e.g. aberrant winter behavior, scarred and necrotic wing damage, loss of body fat, mass die-offs. It is possible that Gd has been in Europe for a long time and that the bats there have evolved with it and are resistant, but that is a hypothesis at this point, not conclusive.

Given that it would be very easy for humans to transfer spores of the fungus and that it first appeared in a commercial cave in Albany, N.Y., the most plausible hypothesis was that it was accidentally introduced via human traffic from Europe to North America. There is no proof, but it seems likely it might have happened that way.


What do you see as the most momentous aspect of the spread of this fungus? (Why should people “care” given that the species is still abundant elsewhere, etc.?) Read more…