JOEL BANNER BAIRD

Free Press Staff Writer

Snug and suspended in caves, Vermont's northern long-eared bats are sleeping through an important debate.

The question posed by wide-awake humans: Should those bats be listed as nationally "endangered" (presently at the brink of extinction) — or merely "threatened" (likely to approach that collapse in the near future)?

Should the hibernating bats care?

The northern long-eared bat, after all, has enjoyed full-on endangered status here in Vermont since 2010, when the full impact of a devastating fungal infection, known as white-nose syndrome, became apparent.

In these parts, plenty of folks cheer for the return of nocturnal insect-gobblers.

Elsewhere in the country, full protection of the bat runs up against timber and mining interests.

Those competing visions of the northern long-eared bat's future converge on Dec. 18 — the deadline established by the National Fish and Wildlife Service for public comment.

White-nose syndrome, since its discovery in a New York cave in 2006, reduced the bat's numbers in this state by about 95 percent, Vermont Fish and Wildlife Department biologist Scott Darling said Thursday.

Evidence suggests the disease, which fatally rouses hibernating bats, remains a potent threat here and throughout the animal's considerable range, Darling added.

Populations remain vulnerable to collapse, from Quebec to central Alabama and, and west to Nebraska and the Dakotas.

"I have yet to see the data that would suggest otherwise," Darling said.

Last year, the federal Fish and Wildlife Service held the same view, and recommended a full "endangered" listing.

This year, the agency, acknowledging considerable push-back, postponed the procedure and re-opened the public-comment period.

The most vocal opposition has emerged from improbable places.

In a letter to the federal agency in mid-November, John Arway, president of the 12-state Northeast Association of Fish and Wildlife Agencies, wrote "While the numbers are significantly lower throughout most of New York, there is evidence that extirpation (extinction) in even the hardest hit state is not imminent."

Arway touted the region's ongoing conservation efforts as effective, but which "may be in jeopardy" due to the "potential regulatory burden" of an endangered listing for the northern long-eared bat.

Finally, Arway pledged his organization's support for a less-constraining "threatened" designation — as long as exemptions are in place to reduce "the inevitable conflicts with the millions of forest owners" throughout the range of the species and allowing natural resource agencies to focus on the cause of the decline."

Priorities

Did Vermont sign on to that letter?

Not really; nor did New Hampshire and Maine (last year, the three state's agencies endorsed the endangered listing).

Vermont wildlife biologist Darling's diplomatic answer: This fall's statement from the Northeast Association expressed the opinion of "a quorum" of states.

More explicitly, Darling worked with other Vermont officials in drafting a fresh letter to the federal government.

This one, signed by Agency of Natural Resources Secretary Deb Markowitz and mailed Thursday, further validates the endangered status of the bat in Vermont, and argues that nothing less than full protection will serve the species' survival:

•Unlike the little brown bat, which is also listed as endangered in Vermont, the northern long-eared bat's plummet shows no sign of slowing, according to the most recent data analysis.

•The recovery of northern long-eared bats will almost certainly depend on healthy populations in neighboring states, and careful management of forest habitat for summer nesting.

•Vermont's approaches to forest management for bats (maintaining tree diversity, dead and dying snags and water quality) have benefited fragile populations — as well as the human landowners.

The letter from Markowitz stops short of advocating for federal endangered status for northern long-eared bat (acronym: NLEB). But it makes the case for national unity: "The NLEB requires range-wide protection from all significant sources of mortality."

Other state's perceptions, Darling adds, might reasonably differ — particularly where white-nose syndrome is newer and hasn't yet exacted a massive toll on bats.

Foresters' concerns

Darling said foresters have successfully weathered "reasonable and practical" restrictions on logging due to another bat that nests in trees during the summer: the Indiana bat, which received federal endangered listing in the 1970s.

Vermont appears to be outnumbered.

Beyond the Northeast (and in the absence of a wholesale exposure to white-nose syndrome) letters opposed to federal endangered status for the northern long-eared bat have been filed by several regional fish-and-wildlife associations.

They include: the Midwestern Association of Fish and Wildlife Agencies, the Southeastern Association of Fish and Wildlife Agencies, the Southern Group of State Foresters and the Northeastern Area Association of State Foresters.

Judicial threat

A letter submitted in August by the West Virginia Chamber of Commerce to the U.S. Fish and Wildlife agency pitched the debate in terms of federal-versus-states' rights: "A Failed Collaborative."

Its author, Kathy G. Beckett, an attorney at the Charleston, W.Va. offices of law firm Steptoe & Johnson, wrote that states' objections to the proposed endangered status for the bat, if ignored, "will constitute a significant legal and policy error that will warrant judicial review."

Beckett has credentials in big-league environmental tussles that lie squarely behind extractive industries. According to her online biography, she has represented oil and gas exploration and production facilities, chemical manufacturing firms, and coal-fired power plants.

They cite, above all, concerns by the forestry industry.

Lobbies line up

Might those objections be exaggerated?

"They're way overblown," Mollie Matteson, a Richmond-based senior scientist with the Center for Biological Diversity, said this week. "Listing does bring some federal oversight into the process, but it also brings in extra resources for action and research.

"Added precautions might be inconvenient sometimes — but inconvenience is not a good reason when we're talking about a species that is veering toward extinction," she added.

And what's with all those regional fish-and-wildlife associations putting on the brakes?

"Those agencies," Matteson said, "are not the same as rank-and-file biologists."

Get urgent?

A letter to federal regulators on Dec. 8, signed by 40 scientists around the U.S. and Canada, offers the possibility that the northern long-eared bat's precarious state might have preceded white-nose syndrome.

Habitat loss and fragmentation, environmental toxins and climate change have likely lowered the bat's resiliency, the letter continues.

All the more reason to cast the creature a life-line of full protection, the scientists write.

They conclude: "Decisions on endangered species must be made in real time, using currently available information, and such decisions by their very nature are urgent, as well as often politically controversial."

Contact Joel Banner Baird at 660-1843 or joelbaird@FreePressMedia.com. Follow him on Twitter at www.twitter.com/vtgoingup.

Have an opinion?

The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service is accepting public comment until Dec. 18 on whether to list the northern long-eared bat as an endangered species.

•Online: At the Federal eRulemaking Portal: http://www.regulations.gov, enter in the Search box, Docket No. FWS–R5–ES–2011–0024.

Click on "Comment Now!"

•By mail, address comments to:

Public Comments Processing,

Attn: FWS–R5–ES–2011–0024

Division of Policy and Directives Management

U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, MS: BPHC;

5275 Leesburg Pike, Falls Church,

VA 22041-3803