By ANDREW C. REVKIN
August 5, 2010, 4:50 pm A research team organized by Thomas Kunz of Boston University has concluded in a new paper that a common, beneficial bat species is likely to be completely wiped out across much of the Northeastern United States within 20 years due to a spreading fungal infection. The basics are laid out in the news section of the journal Science, which is also publishing the research paper. The news report mentions that bat biologists suggest landowners can create boost bats’ prospects by erecting bat houses. I sent some questions about the fungal peril to North American bats to Winifred Frick, one of the paper’s authors and a National Science Foundation bioinformatics fellow at Boston University and the University of California, Santa Cruz. Here’s our exchange, with a bit of editing to eliminate e-mail shorthand: Q: What do you see as the most momentous aspect of the spread of this fungus? (Why should people “care” given that the species is still abundant elsewhere, etc.?) A: Bats perform valuable ecosystem services to humans, in terms of suppression of insect populations that can be agricultural or forest pests and these bats do eat some insects that are annoying or pose health risks to humans. An individual bat can consume its body weight in insects in a night, so the loss of a regional population of millions of bats adds up to a huge number of uneaten insects in the night sky. …

Fungus on Track to Extinguish Bats in Northeast