White Nose Confirmed in Tennessee

Tri colored bat with White Nose Syndrome in Worley’s Cave, Sullivan County. Credit TWRA/Sterling Daniels

A mysterious fungus that’s been killing bats by the hundreds of thousands across the Northeast has reached Tennessee. State biologists have confirmed the first cases of White Nose Syndrome in the state.

Three tri-colored bats were found dead in upper east Tennessee with the characteristic white nose associated with the killer fungus. They had been hibernating in Worley’s Cave, which is located in Sullivan County and frequented by cavers.

White Nose has been spreading rapidly, with the first cases discovered in upstate New York three years ago. Last year, White Nose tracked as far south as Virginia. TWRA endangered species coordinator Richard Kirk says even closing caves on Tennessee’s public lands last year didn’t prevent the spread.

“It’s not unexpected, but it’s something we were hoping to delay.”

Kirk says the state depends on bats to control mosquito populations and other flying insects.

“They’re eating our neighborhood pests, our agriculture pests, providing us that service every night. If we lose up to 500,000, one-million bats in the next few years, then we lose the service they provide.”

Credit TWRA/Sterling Daniels

While feeding, a single Little Brown Bat can eat as many as 1,200 insects an hour.

There are 15 bat species in Tennessee. Cory Holliday of The Nature Conservancy says two of the endangered bats – the Indiana and gray – could lose large colonies. The mortality rate for sites infected with White Nose is 95 percent.

Biologists believe there’s a strong possibility humans could spread the fungus from cave to cave on their unwashed gear. However, White Nose is primarily transmitted from bat to bat.