Bats have a new monster to fear.
Bats have long been associated with the dark and deadly, most infamously in the form of that monstrous prowler of the night, Dracula — in search of fresh blood to feed his thirst and claim new victims. On Halloweens of late, however, it is bats who have had a monster to fear — a real one — that is devastating populations of these flying mammals in eastern North America.
The villain is an introduced fungus that has compromised the bat’s ability to survive winters by matching its energy consumption to expected expenditure. Normally, healthy bats do this by eating insects and putting on the fat in the fall. The stored fat is used to survive until spring — sometimes for a period of more than six months.
