Bat team to probe ‘black hole’
Researchers trying to track fatal disease
Not much is known about bats in the Flathead River Valley.
On Thursday, Cori Lausen and a bat team will head to southeastern British Columbia for a four-day BioBlitz in an attempt to find out more.
“It’s really the only place left in southern British Columbia that has not been inventoried for bats,” said Lausen, a research biologist and bat specialist with the Wildlife Conservation Society Canada.
“It’s been a black hole for everybody trying to guess what’s there.”
Their work, organized by conservation groups, could help advance bat protection in the area and ultimately minimize the impacts of white-nose syndrome — a fungal disease that’s killed at least 5.5 million bats throughout Eastern Canada and the United States.
It hasn’t yet hit Alberta or B.C., but teams of scientists have been working to tally the bats before its arrival.
“Our main goal is to understand what species we have on the landscape right now,” said Lausen, noting there are some low mountain passes and drainages that could make it easy for bats to get into the area.
“Basically it’s just establishing some baseline data.
“We want to understand the Flathead because it might be a gateway for white-nose to get into the province.”
The Flathead has long been recognized as the missing piece of the Waterton-Glacier International Peace Park — with a recent report suggesting the park isn’t sustainable if it doesn’t expand.
Conservation groups, including Yellowstone to Yukon Conservation Initiative and Wildsight, are trying to get it protected from industrial uses such as logging.
“The Flathead has proven to be such an interesting place in terms of North American biodiversity,” said John Bergenske, executive director of Wildsight.
“We are trying to fill in all of the different pieces.”
It’s expected scientists will find a number of different species of bats in the area due to the variety of habitats available, he said.
During the bat team’s time in the Flathead, Lausen said they will build on an initial inventory gathered last June during a similar BioBlitz.
“We had horrible weather,” she said.
“I am surprised we caught any bats but we did, which suggests there are a lot of bats there.”
They caught five species of bats — little brown, big brown, long-eared, long-legged and Californian — but Lausen believes there could be up to 11 different kinds of bats in the area.
A similar survey done by Lausen in Waterton Lakes National Park detected a species that wasn’t previously found in Alberta.
“I couldn’t catch it, so I couldn’t say for sure which one it was,” she said, noting there’s two species — the California miotis and the Yuma miotis — with similar acoustics.
“I left it dangling, but there’s another species in Alberta.
“It looks like it’s only found in the far southwest corner of Waterton Lakes National Park — therefore it must trickle over and be in the B.C. Flathead.”
She said it’s likely a California miotis, which she caught last June in the Flathead.
“It’s possible it’s also Yuma miotis so I am hoping we can catch that one as well,” said Lausen.
“If we don’t, it will actually solve the mystery of what’s in Alberta as well.”