WNS update

Amy

New member
I am a proud member of the Southeaster Cave Conservancy, inc. Started by cavers to protect and conserve caves and manage logical access, they have done wonders in this time of government trying to close caves.

Sadly, WNS and/or GD has been found this winter on four of their properties. Inevitable, of course, as it continues it's spread in the US. I truly believe in light of all the evidence and things happening here, that the key statement from Ron Miller (chair) should be the sound byte spread and adapted by ALL agencies! And it is reassuring that there are logical people out there:

?We have learned the hard way that abandonment is not management, and as a result the SCCi board will continue to use adaptive management techniques to ensure that bat populations and fragile cave environments are well protected while still allowing for reasonable public access.?

Read full release:
http://scci.org/News/WNS2013.html

 

Amy

New member
That's old news - it's been long determined that GD is the same that is in the UK, and Europe. And that even your bats over the pond that exhibit physical signs of WNS do not have the morbidity rates/effects that we have here. I don't have the publications handy or I'd link to the journals.

WNS is down here in the south now. But our shorter and warmer winters have proven helpful, we are not seeing massive deaths and a species we were very worried about, Gray Bats, a federally endangered species that roosts in large hibernaculums in clusters of thousands, although every sample has show positive for the fungus via PCR, there are no mortalities and no outward signs of the disease WNS although the fungus is 100% present.

Thus far, it's the little browns which also roost in clusters and largely more north with longer and colder winters, that best estimates have about a 90% mortality rate. But, among those, band tracking is showing some survive - multiple winters - AND rear young.

Stuff will settle back down eventually. Nature will come to a new balance.

Something that is nice is the theory of a bat hitchiking overseas and being the "patient 0" so to speak in the US, has been proven to be a viable theory. And because no one can prove that cavers can spread it (in fact studies have shown it takes direct contact eg only infected bats infect other bats (studies are out on the cave wall/mud being another transfer vector) - but cavers don't mess with bats or their hibernaculums, so that's taken some the heat off.
 

cavermark

New member
WNS = White nose syndrome
GD = Geomyces destructans?

BBC = British Broadcasting Corporation

PCR = ?

(It's hard deciphering accronyms when I've just woken up)
 

Amy

New member
Sorry, yes, PCR is polymerase chain reaction it's a way of genotyping something, basically. We can test for the presence of Geomyces Destructans (GD) even if no symptoms of White Nose Syndrome (WNS) is present.

Think of it as like lots of people carry staphylococcus (staph). But it doesn't infect anywhere near how many people have it. Being exposed to the germ, if you will, is not the same as having the disease/all the effects associated with it even if it is on/in your body.

Same thing with GD vs WNS. =) A bat can be what is called PCR+ aka a PCR test showed that it has GD on it's skin, but WNS- aka no signs/symptoms of WNS.
 
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