Bat Acoustic Monitoring at Jewel Cave National Monument

An acoustic recording station in Jewel Cave National Monument

NPS

Overview

Jewel Cave National Monument is a 1,274-acre park in the Black Hills of western South Dakota established to protect the third longest cave in the world. While the main visitor area of the cave does not have bats, an entrance enlarged in the early 1900s is now used as a bat hibernaculum (winter home for bats). Surface water is rare in the park where the majority of habitat is open ponderosa pine forest with grassland meadows, though there is a sewage pond that potentially provides a source of drinking water for bats.

The Northern Great Plains Inventory & Monitoring Network monitors to detect long-trends and to get early warning of undesirable changes in bat populations at the park. A fungal disease called white-nose syndrome is spreading quickly, threatening bat populations in North America. First documented in a New York cave in 2006, this disease is associated with more than seven million bat deaths. It spreads primarily from bat to bat and humans might be spreading the disease by carrying nearly invisible fungal spores on their shoes and clothing from one cave to another. Bat monitoring helps us understand changes occurring with the spread of this devastating disease.

Acoustic Monitoring

Four acoustic recording stations were established in 2014 and 2015 at Jewel Cave National Monument. Acoustic recorders detect the unique ultrasonic calls bats use for echolocation. There were 30,450 bat call recordings from stations across all survey nights from 2014 to 2017. The data were analyzed through specialized software programs that make preliminary identifications of the bat species based on individual call characteristics, such as frequency and shape. Some bat species make calls that are similar to other species, which is why researchers with special expertise review the calls and make the final species determinations.

Northern long-eared bats (Myotis septentrionalis), a threatened species, were detected at Jewel Cave National Monument

Pete Pattavina/USFWS (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0/legalcode,cropped)

Bats at the Park (2014- 2017)

Eleven bat species were detected at Jewel Cave National Monument. Status is based on acoustic recording classifications in specialized software and researcher expertise.

Common Name	Scientific Name	2014–2017 Status
Townsend's big-eared bat	Corynorhinus townsendii	Present
Big brown bat	Eptesicus fuscus	Present
Eastern red bat	Lasiurus borealis	Present
Hoary bat	Lasiurus cinereus	Present
Silver-haired bat	Lasionycteris noctivagans	Present
Western small-footed myotis	Myotis ciliolabrum	Present
Little brown bat	Myotis lucifugus	Present
Northern long-eared bat	Myotis septentrionalis	Present
Fringed myotis	Myotis thysanodes	Present
Long-legged myotis	Myotis volans	Present
Tri-colored bat	Perimyotis subflavus	Present

• Eastern red bat, and tri-colored bats were new detections for the park. These two species are on the western edge of their range at Jewel Cave National Monument. Hear what a Eastern red bat sounds like!
• Big brown, hoary, and silver-haired bats were recorded most often on the park. The historically common long-legged myotis made up only a small proportion of the acoustic recordings.
• The threatened northern long-eared bat is present on the park, but was detected in very low numbers. It was also captured in mist nets in 2017. This species is heavily impacted by white-nose syndrome and it has suffered large population declines throughout its range in recent years.
• The sewage pond likely plays a critical role in bat reproduction, lactating females make regular use of surface water and the acoustic station by the pond had the highest rate of detections.
• Little brown bats, known to forage over water, were more common at the sewage pond, whereas the western small-footed myotis, an arid land species, was more frequent in the dry Lithograph Canyon site.
• In addition to our work, park staff are monitoring bats using acoustic recorders, cave surveys, and telemetry.

Townend's big-eared bats (Corynorhinus townsendii) were detected at Jewel Cave National Monument. They prefer roosting in cool cave entrances, and are very sensitive to disturbance.

NPS/Timpanogos Cave National Monument

White-nose Syndrome

White-nose syndrome has not yet been detected at the park, it was detected on a bat in Black Hills National Forest, just south of the boundary of Jewel Cave National Monument. See a map of white-nose syndrome in national parks and learn more about how you can help prevent the spread of this fungus. Continued monitoring, and park staff and visitor observations, will help us protect the bat communities that live and forage in the park.

For More Information

Dan Licht, Midwest Region Wildlife Biologist

Protocol Contact: Northern Great Plains Network

Summary by Tani Hubbard, updated in 2019