Deadly bat fungus already in Europe

White-nose syndrome has killed a million bats in the US in just five years

August 2010: Within five years the death toll of North American bats succumbing to ‘white-nose syndrome' has reached the one million threshold, now the deadly causative fungus - Geomyces destructans - has been identified in a number of European countries but without detrimental effects for the native bat populations.

WHITE DEATH: The fungus is wiping out bats in their thousands in the USA. Credit: Nancy Heaslip, New York Dept. of Environmental Conservation.

Since 2006 unprecedented mass mortalities have been recorded in North American hibernating bat populations. More than a million animals died and the scale of the problem continues to increase. Initially the first dramatic declines remained within the northeastern states of the US, then spread to neighbouring regions and earlier this year reached Canada.

In Europe, concerns are rising that this fungus might be transferred to the European continent and then might possibly pose a similar threat to native bat species here.

Europe's bats don't die after being colonised by the same fungus
Now a collective project by researchers from Germany, Switzerland, Hungary and the United Kingdom, the mycology department of the hospital of Munich Technical University, the Robert Koch Institute and the IZW shows that the fungus occurs in several European countries - the only previous record was that of a single bat reported from France. The scientists also unearthed early reports indicating that the fungus was already noted on hibernating bats in Germany 25 years ago.

‘So far it seems that a colonisation by the fungus has no detrimental effect on European bat species,' says IZW project leader Dr. Gudrun Wibbelt.

Researchers investigated more than 350 hibernacula in different European countries and found 21 animals carrying the fungus. Typically, bats have distinctive small white fungal patches around their nose and wing membranes, hence it being dubbed ‘white-nose syndrome'.

May provide answer to US crisis
The fungus belongs to the group of cold-loving fungi which preferably degrade keratinous materials like flakes of skin or hair. In North America, the fungus causes severe tissue destruction in bats which then subsequently can lead to the death of the animal.

The previously undescribed fungus was identified for the first time in 2008 in the US. American scientists are certain that the mass mortalities are directly linked to this new emerging fungal infection.

‘Surprisingly, comparative molecular genetic analyses revealed a 100 per cent identity between gene segments of the North American and European fungal strains. Now the most important task is to understand why European bats do not die after being colonised by the fungus. Hopefully this will give a lead to rescue their North American relatives - or at least to prevent the fatal fungus being brought into Europe. All investigations aim to protect bat populations in Europe as well as in North America,' says Dr Wibbelt.