Ecological and economic importance of bats

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Abandoned mines now serve as important year-round sanctuaries for bats. Many of North America’s largest remaining bat populations roost in mines. These include more than half of the continent's 45 bat species and some of the largest populations of endangered bats. Bats have lost countless traditional roosts in caves and old tree hollows and many have gradually moved into abandoned mines, which can provide similar environments. Mine closures without first surveying for bats can have potentially serious ecological and economic consequences. Bats are primary predators of night-flying insects, and many such insects rank among North America’s most costly agricultural and forest pests. These pests include cucumber, potato, and snout beetles; corn-earworm, cotton-bollworm, and grain moths; leafhoppers; and mosquitoes. A single little brown bat (Myotis lucifugus) can catch more than 1,200 mosquito-sized insects in an hour. A mine roosting colony of just 150 big brown bats (Eptesicus fuscus) can eat sufficient cucumber beetles each summer to protect farmers from 33 million of these beetles’ root worm larvae, pests that cost American farmers an estimated billion dollars annually. And a colony of Mexican free-tailed bats (Tadarida brasiliensis) living in the old Orient Mine consumes nearly two tons of insects nightly, largely crop-consuming moths. In the western states, pallid bats (Antrozous pallidus) benefit ranchers by consuming large quantities of grasshoppers and crickets. Lesser and greater long-nosed bats (Leptonycteris curasoae and L. nivalis) and long-tongued bats (Choeronycteris mexicana) are believed to be important pollinators for some 60 species of agave plants and serve as both pollinators and seed dispersers for dozens of species of columnar cacti, including organ pipe and saguaro, which rank among the southwestern deserts’ most familiar and ecologically important plants. Despite their critical role in our environment and economy, available evidence suggests that millions of bats have already been lost during abandoned mine safety closures or renewed mining in historic districts. These actions could endanger even currently abundant species, forcing the need for Federal listing at considerable taxpayer expense. The loss of bats can increase our reliance on chemical pesticides (which often threaten both environmental and human health), jeopardize whole ecosystems of other plants and animals, and harm human economies. The cost of surveying and protecting key mine roosts is small compared to the benefits provided by these valuable night-flying allies.

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ELECTRONIC FILE - Zoology

SWAP (2/19/2016) citation:
Ducummon SL. 2000. Ecological and economic importance of bats. In: Vories KC and D Throgmorton, editors. Proceedings of Bat Conservation and Mining: A Technical Interactive Forum; 2000 Nov 14–16; St. Louis. Alton (IL): US Department of the Interior, Office of Surface Mining. p. 7–16. [accessed 2015 Dec 4]. http://69.90.183.227/financial/values/g-ecobats.pdf.

Entire proceedings can be found at http://www.osmre.gov/resources/library/proceedings/2000BatConservationMi.... (TOC indicates page numbers, but the pages themselves are unnumbered. Also the numbers given for this document are 7-16, which is 10 pages, but this paper covers 12 pages, but includes 2 tables.).

Additional information if wanted: Sponsored by U. S. Department of the Interior, Office of Surface Mining; Bat Conservation International; Southern Illinois University at Carbondale, Coal Research Center.