Title
What is winter - Modelling spatial variation in bat host traits and hibernation and their implications for overwintering energetics
Author(s)
Hranac, C., Haase, C.G., Fuller, N.W., McClure, M.L., Marshall, J.C., Lausen, C.L. , McGuire, L.P., Olson, S.H. and Hayman, D.T.S. 2021.
Published
2021
Publisher
Ecology and Evolution
Abstract
White-nose syndrome (WNS) has decimated hibernating bat populations across eastern and central North America for over a decade. Disease severity is driven by the interaction between bat characteristics, the cold-loving fungal agent, and the hibernation environment. While we further improve hibernation energetics models, we have yet to examine how spatial heterogeneity in host traits is linked to survival in this disease system. Here we develop predictive spatial models of body mass for the little brown myotis (Myotis lucifugus) and reassess previous definitions of the duration of hibernation of this species. Using data from published literature, public databases, local experts, and our own fieldwork, we fit a series of generalized linear models with hypothesized abiotic drivers to create distribution-wide predictions of pre-hibernation body fat and hibernation duration. Our results provide improved estimations of hibernation duration and identify a scaling relationship between body mass and body fat; this relationship allows for the first continuous estimates of pre-hibernation body mass and fat across the species’ distribution. We used these results to inform a hibernation energetic model to create spatially-varying fat use estimates for M. lucifugus. These results predict that WNS mortality of newly and soon-to-be infected M. lucifugus populations in western North America may be comparable to the substantial die-off observed in eastern and central populations.
Keywords
Hibernation energetics; Myotis lucifugus; Pseudogymnoascus destructans; white-nose syndrome; winter duration
Full Citation
Hranac, C., Haase, C.G., Fuller, N.W., McClure, M.L., Marshall, J.C., Lausen, C.L. , McGuire, L.P., Olson, S.H. and Hayman, D.T.S. 2021. What is winter? Modelling spatial variation in bat host traits and hibernation and their implications for overwintering energetics. Ecology and Evolution, in press
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