The bat problem’s gone from bad to worse since I wrote about it six weeks or so ago.  From today’s NY Times:

In what is one of the worst calamities to hit bat populations in the United States, on average 90 percent of the hibernating bats in four caves and mines in New York have died since last winter.           

Wildlife biologists fear a significant die-off in about 15 caves and mines in New York, as well as at sites in Massachusetts and Vermont. Whatever is killing the bats leaves them unusually thin and, in some cases, dotted with a white fungus. Bat experts fear that what they call White Nose Syndrome may spell doom for several species that keep insect pests under control.

Researchers have yet to determine whether the bats are being killed by a virus, bacteria, toxin, environmental hazard, metabolic disorder or fungus. Some have been found with pneumonia, but that and the fungus are believed to be secondary symptoms.  

Bat sightings in the middle of the day, and in the middle of winter, told scientists that something is seriously wrong. As Al Hicks, a mammal specialist with the Environmental Conservation Department, pointed out, “Bats don’t fly in the daytime, and bats don’t fly in the winter. Every bat you see out here is a “Ëœdead bat flying,’ so to speak.”

Merlin Tuttle, president of Bat Conservation International, told the Times “So far as we can tell at this point, this may be the most serious threat to North American bats we’ve experienced in recorded history.”

One potential cause for the die-off could be “recently introduced pesticides, including those released to stop West Nile virus,” which may be toxic to the bats, or simply depriving them of one of their major food sources, insects.

Oops. Talk about the law of unintended consequences. As Scott Darling, a wildlife biologist with the Fish and Wildlife Department, told the Times, “Logic dictates when you are potentially losing as many as a half a million bats in this region, there are going to be ramifications for insect abundance in the coming summer.”

Insect abundance? That’s geek speak for “mosquito explosion.” To put it in layperson’s terms, the buzz is bad. Find out how you can help at Bat Conservation Inernational.