Kirtland helps prevent spread of bats' white-nose syndrome

  • Published
  • By Adam Bailey
  • Nucleus writer
KIRTLAND AIR FORCE BASE, N.M. --  The Kirtland Natural Resource office is taking steps to protect bats against whitenose syndrome.

White-nose syndrome is named after a fungal growth that occurs on the bats' snouts. The fungus was first found in 2006 in a cave in New York and has spread as far south as Alabama and as far west as Missouri. The disease has caused more than 5.5 million bat deaths according to the U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service website, www.fws.org.

"The fungus grows on the nose and occurs more in hibernation when bats aren't constantly moving and cleaning themselves. The fungus causes them to wake up, fly out of the cave and die from starvation or the cold," said Dustin Akins, natural resource specialist. "This is detrimental to bats because they typically only give birth once a year to one offspring, so they can't come back as easy from a decline in population."

Several government agencies are getting ready should a case of the disease be found in New Mexico.

"The disease has been stalled in Missouri for about a year now, but I'm on a committee now that meets several times a year to work on finalizing a plan if the disease spreads to New Mexico," Akins said.

Other members of the committee include Cannon Air Force Base, Holloman Air Force Base, White Sands Missile Range, U.S. Forest Service, U.S. Bureau of Land Management and U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service.

Although bats are found on base, there are no ongoing bat studies. The most recent studies went from 2007 through 2011 and included information about bat diversity and reproduction.
"We usually have constant studies on a species if they are endangered or at risk of becoming endangered. Otherwise, we do studies on a species to collect data we can use later, such as if we found a bat with white-nose syndrome on base," Akins said.

The most recent study found that Kirtland has nine to 14 species of bats and they tend
to use the one-seed juniper to roost and raise their young.