This white-nose syndrome (WNS) funding is needed to help south carolina achieve its WNS goals through statewide hibernacula surveys and pseudogymnoascus destructans (PD) surveillance, as well as…

This white-nose syndrome (WNS) funding is needed to help south carolina achieve its WNS goals through statewide hibernacula surveys and pseudogymnoascus destructans (PD) surveillance, as well as continued long-term acoustic monitoring for WNS-affected species. We will accomplish this through the following objectives: 1) ship BAT samples from rabies-negative bats submitted to south carolina department of public health (scdph) to the southeastern cooperative wildlife disease study (scwds) for WNS testing, as scdph makes those specimens available. Ship specimens of BAT species known to be affected by WNS from public sources, and sick or dead bats collected from objective 2 2) conduct hibernacula surveys and WNS surveillance while following the national WNS decontamination protocol in ten of SCS largest pesu hibernacula. These surveys will include two SC nabat priority culverts 3) run statewide nabat acoustic monitoring in at least 33 of the 38 pre-determined priority nabat cells in the spring summer of 2026 4) process and upload priority 2025-2026 scdnr BAT data into the nabat database including 2025 26 winter counts from objective 2 and 2026 SC nabat data from objective 3 and 5) keep staff and partners current by participating in WNS partner conference calls and the 2026 WNS workshop and 2026 southeastern BAT diversity network meeting. The anticipated results from accomplishing these objectives include producing high priority BAT population data across south carolina while monitoring the spread of PD and contributing to pesu research in the southeast, submitting that comprehensive data collected into the nabat portal for population analyses, continuing to keep our SC nabat acoustic project running smoothly in its 12TH year, and keeping staff and partners current by participating in WNS and local BAT meetings.