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Endless Caverns Bats Suspect: Animals Show Indications Of Mysterious Disease
DNR Online - www.dnronline.com
28 Apr 2009
Area: New Market, Rockingham County, Virginia, USA - Map It

Samples of bats found in the Endless Caverns show cave and suspected of having the deadly white-nose syndrome have been sent to a federal testing facility, the Virginia Department of Game and Inland Fisheries confirmed Friday.

If the tests come back positive, it will be the first confirmed case in Rockingham County of the mysterious disease that has wiped out hundreds of thousands of bats in the Northeast. The disease showed up in Virginia for the first time earlier this year, but until now, no bats in the central Valley had been suspected of having the illness.

>>> FULL ARTICLE

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Reported Wildlife Mortality Events to the USGS National Wildlife Health Center Updated
USGS National Wildlife Health Center
29 Apr 2009
Area: United States

USGS and a network of partners across the country work on documenting wildlife mortality events in order to provide timely and accurate information on locations, species and causes of death. This information was updated on Apr 27, 2009 on the USGS National Wildlife Health Center web page, New and Ongoing Wildlife Mortality Events Nationwide. Quarterly Mortality Reports are also available from this page. These reports go back to 1995.

>>> Updated Wildlife Mortality Event Table

As insects expand, new areas may become prone to Lyme disease
Insciences Organisation - insciences.org (Source: UW-Madison)
27 Apr 2009
N Miller
Photo credit: B Richter
Area: Wisconsin, United States

Last summer, after returning home from a walk in Madison's Dudgeon-Monroe neighborhood, Susan Paskewitz was astonished to find a deer tick crawling up her dog's hind leg. It was the first time Paskewitz, a University of Wisconsin-Madison entomologist, had collected a tick in the city. Within the month, she learned of two other such cases.

"It was striking to get three (deer ticks) last year in the Madison metro area," says Paskewitz, who specializes in mosquitoes and ticks. "We usually only get one every few years."

Deer ticks — the type known for carrying Lyme disease — are widely associated with Wisconsin's Northwoods. In truth, however, they occupy a much larger territory. In 1994, a deer tick "census" led by Paskewitz revealed they had already become established in the western two-thirds of the state. Since then, reports of Lyme disease and new infestations led Paskewitz to suspect that they had become prevalent throughout Wisconsin.

>>>FULL ARTICLE

OTHER WILDLIFE HEALTH RELATED STORIES
Photo credit: BBC News - news.bbc.co.uk