Bat watchers wanted for Georgia DNR summer monitoring project

This photo, provided by south Mississippi state conservation biologist Kathy Shelton, shows tricolored bats hibernating in January in a cave in Wayne County. The site was one of six where samples taken from bats and the cave did not have the fungus that can cause white-nose syndrome. The fungus was found in a box culvert and three other caves checked during the winter the first time it has been found in Mississippi. The scientists did not find any bats that showed symptoms of the disease that has killed 5.7 million bats in 25 states and five Canadian provinces. - photo by Associated Press

White-Nose Syndrome-M Werm — This photo, provided by south Mississippi state conservation biologist Kathy Shelton, shows tricolored bats hibernating in January in a cave in Wayne County. The site was one of six where samples taken from bats and the cave did not have the fungus that can cause white-nose syndrome. The fungus was found in a box culvert and three other caves checked during the winter the first time it has been found in Mississippi. The scientists did not find any bats that showed symptoms of the disease that has killed 5.7 million bats in 25 states and five Canadian provinces. - photo by Associated Press

You've probably seen bats feeding around lights in your neighborhood or dipping across a country road in front of your headlights. But are you seeing them as often as you used to years ago? Biologists with the Georgia Department of Natural Resources are concerned that bat populations may be declining, especially since white-nose syndrome — a fast-spreading disease fatal to bats — was detected in the state last year.

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