Staff from our Bedford, NH office recently attended the Northeast Bat Working Group (NEBWG) conference. The NEBWG is comprised of individuals from various organizations, companies, and government entities with shared interest in bat research, recovery, and education. The conference, which was held in Harrisburg, Pennsylvania this year, included presentations and posters covering a variety of topics ranging from state updates and effective acoustic identification to drone structure assessments and bat rehabilitation.
Among the presentations on the first day of the conference were federal, state, and tribal agency updates. Excitingly, multiple of the presenting northeastern and mid-Atlantic states reported local little brown bat (Myotis lucifugus) numbers are on the rise. While this population growth was not noted for all the states that presented, it is none the less reassuring for little brown bat recovery post white-nose syndrome. White-nose syndrome (WNS) is a fungal disease that infects bats during hibernation and, among other things, causes infected individuals to burn though their fat reserves faster than normal. First detected in New York, WNS has continued to spread west causing widespread population declines for several species. With some populations of little brown bats recovering in nearby states, there is more hope for species recovery and eventually delisting.
Another topic of interest was the advanced, technological ways to assist with optimization and data organization during post processing. At Normandeau, we collect bat acoustic data using detectors set to run for approximately 11 hours each site night for typically four nights per location. A project might need a single detector or multiple depending on project type and proposed impact area and the detectors may remain actively deployed for more than two weeks depending on factors such as weather, wind, and precipitation. Each detector will typically record from a few hundred to over one thousand sound files in a single detector night. All of these recordings are run through an approved classification program that assigns an auto identification. When the classification meets specific parameters, recordings are manually identified as well. The results get incorporated into our reports and are eventually submitted to the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service (USFWS). Many results are also uploaded to the North American Bat Monitoring Program (NABat). In addition to our acoustic recordings, we maintain records of habitat characteristics near deployment sites and visual structure assessments, if relevant, which must also be incorporated into their respective sections in the report. Our initial recordings and other associated data go through several steps of processing from data collection in the field to export into report formats and quality assurance before our final report on the project is sent to the clients. The process of sorting through this data for reporting can be time consuming and requires effective organization to maintain accurate records while minimizing the potential for errors. All in all, it was interesting to hear how other scientists are experimenting with ways to increase efficiency and organization especially when dealing with large data sets and compare it to strategies we use at Normandeau.
The distance to the conference wasn’t a short trip, however this fact encouraged us to arrive a day in advance of the conference. We were able to take advantage of being at the conference venue early and sit in on the pre-meeting session. This year’s session included multiple speakers presenting about different aspects of bat houses. It was interesting to check out one of the activities held before the conference began and learn more about bat house research and innovation. Presenters touched on features that make a bat house successful, general bat ecology, and some innovative bat house designs. They expressed the need for people to be informed about North American bat species housing preferences, as many of the most readily accessible and affordable bat houses in the United States are not constructed or utilized with our local species needs and preferences in mind. For example, many commercially available designs are based on the habits and lifestyle of European bat species, being built smaller and generally single chambered. Successful North American bat houses may also be single chambered, but they tend to be larger, longer, and multi-chambered to suit our bats’ colonial lifestyle and temperature needs. Local bat species tend to prefer bat houses mounted on poles or buildings to those mounted on trees. The tree mounts are easier for predators to access and provide less flight space for bats approaching or leaving the bat house. For more information on the best bat houses to use in the Northeast, visit Mass.gov.
To learn more about how we can help with your next bat-related project, send us a message.
