{"id":11094,"date":"2022-03-31t17:00:54","date_gmt":"2022-03-31t17:00:54","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/dpetrov.2create.studio\/planet\/wordpress\/conservationists-battle-disease-development-and-distrust-to-protect-illinois-crop-saving-bats\/"},"modified":"2023-03-21t19:49:44","modified_gmt":"2023-03-21t19:49:44","slug":"conservationists-battle-disease-development-and-distrust-to-protect-illinois-crop-saving-bats","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"\/\/www.getitdoneaz.com\/story\/conservationists-battle-disease-development-and-distrust-to-protect-illinois-crop-saving-bats\/","title":{"rendered":"conservationists battle disease, development and distrust to protect illinois\u2019 crop-saving bats"},"content":{"rendered":"
by sarah anderson<\/strong><\/p>\n in 2013, joe kath entered a mine and immediately spotted a bat with a white nose. this fuzzy, silvery mustache announced that white-nose syndrome, a deadly bat fungus thought to have spread from europe to north america by travelers, had inevitably invaded illinois. \u201cit was kind of like a gut punch, but we also knew it was coming,\u201d said kath, the endangered and threatened species manager at the illinois department of natural resources.<\/p>\n when covid-19 emerged seven years later, conservation researcher tara hohoff was instructed to stop handling bats. this pause in her work wasn\u2019t implemented because the bats might give her the virus, but rather because she could transmit it to the bats. \u201ci think there\u2019s this fear of: what if we now introduce something else to these bats?\u201d said hohoff, an associate mammologist at the university of illinois urbana-champaign and co-leader of the illinois bat conservation program.<\/p>\n six out of illinois\u2019 13 bat species are classified as endangered, subjected to a myriad of threats ranging from disease to clean energy to agricultural development. researchers across the state are working to protect bats, studying species abundance, activity and habitat to guide conservation practices. facing the aftermath of association between bats and covid-19 and a period of increased rabies cases from bat bites, conservationists are engaging in public outreach to gain support for an often criticized, yet critical, creature. \u201cthese organisms that we are so hard on are incredibly valuable to our persistence as a species on this planet,\u201d said mark davis, a conservation biologist at the university of illinois urbana-champaign and co-leader of the illinois bat conservation program.<\/p>\n with mortality rates exceeding 90%, white-nose syndrome has killed about 7 million bats in north america since it was detected on the continent in 2006, kath said. the affected species include the federally endangered indiana bat and the northern long-eared bat as well as the \u201ccommon\u201d tricolored bat and little brown bat. white-nose syndrome has depleted over 90% of the northern long-eared, tricolored and little brown bat populations, according to the united states geological survey<\/a>. given this devastating toll, the latter two species may soon be listed as endangered or threatened, kath said. <\/p>\n