“We’d lose one after the next”: Texas bats face a pandemic of their own
There should have been 16,000 bats flying that night in mid-July. Instead, only about 500 remained at the cave in Central Texas next to the Colorado River. The rest succumbed to white-nose syndrome, a fungal disease that has ravaged bat populations across the country.
Find the full story from The Texas Tribune here & an Instagram reel of the story here.
Across North America, 52% of bat species are at risk of severe population decline in the next 15 years, according to a report published in April by the North American Bat Conservation Alliance. Texas — home to the greatest diversity of bat species in the nation — has not been spared that decline.
So far, white-nose syndrome has been detected only on cave myotis bats, but Nate Fuller, bat specialist with Texas Parks and Wildlife, said it’s just a matter of time before it spreads to other species.
After white-nose syndrome was first confirmed in Texas, Fuller started surveying bat roosts in the state. Gradual population declines had been happening for a while, Fuller said, but accurate estimates — bats are notoriously hard to count — didn’t exist.
According to a 2011 study by leading bat researchers published in Science, bats save farmers $12 to $172 per acre in pest control costs nationally each year. In Texas alone, they estimated that bats saved $1.4 billion by eating crop pests.
Pecan farmer Troy Swift said he never planned to get into bats. But after reconnecting with his old acquaintance Merlin Tuttle — a leading international bat expert — there was no going back for Swift, now the proud owner of 18 bat boxes and counting.
Bats also draw in tourism to the state.
Austin’s Congress Avenue Bridge colony attracts 140,000 visitors each year, according to the Texas Parks and Wildlife Department.
Just as climate change has led to an increase in extreme heat events in Texas, it’s also caused an increase in extreme cold that can harm bats. During the 2021 winter storm that hammered most of Texas with days of below-freezing temperatures, the Austin Bat Refuge took in 4,000 bats that had fallen from bridges across Travis County. Only 600 survived.
“Bats are unique, awesome, wonderful parts of nature,” Fuller said. “Whether I can say that they’re worth money, or they’re worth tourism, or they warn you about things that are happening in the environment around you, they’re just so freaking cool.”
