Influence of underground mining with explosives on a hibernating bat population. Issue 1 (7th December 2022)

• Record Type: Journal Article
• Authors: Summers, Jennifer L.; White, John Paul; Kaarakka, Heather M.; Hygnstrom, Scott E.; Sedinger, Benjamin S.; Riddle, Jason; Van Deelen, Timothy; Yahnke, Christopher
• Is Part Of: Conservation science and practice. Volume 5:Issue 1(2023)
• Page Start: n/a
• Page End: n/a
• Publication Date: 2022-12-07
• Subjects: bats -- blasting -- disturbance -- hibernaculum -- hibernation -- torpor; Biodiversity conservation -- Periodicals; Biodiversity conservation; Periodicals; 333.951605
• DOI: 10.1111/csp2.12849
• Languages: English
• ISSNs: 2578-4854

Abstract

Abstract: Bats arouse from hibernation both naturally and in response to disturbances. Frequent bat arousals can decrease survival due to increased energetic costs. An active sand mine in west‐central Wisconsin hosted over 52, 000 hibernating bats of 4 species in inactive tunnels, and regularly blasted with explosives to remove sand. We collected environmental and acoustic data at this mine during two hibernation seasons (November 1 through February 28 in 2013–2014 and 2014–2015) to examine the effect of blasting on echolocation calls (bat activity), a measure of bat arousal from hibernation. We used total bat activity recorded 7 h before and 7 h after blast time as the response variable, assigned it to a binary category and used that as a fixed effect. We used explosive charge per delay (kg), number of blasts per day, number of consecutive blast days, barometric pressure, temperature, and hibernation season as fixed effects. We used generalized linear mixed models with a negative binomial distribution and Bayesian information criterion (BIC) for model selection. The BIC‐optimal model did not include any of the variables associated with blasting, but included activity timing, temperature, barometric pressure, and season as fixed effects, of which all were significant. Blasting did not influence bat activity significantly in this mine. Abstract : We investigated the influence of blasting with explosives on bat activity at an underground mine that hosted up to 52, 000 hibernating bats of 4 species. Blasting had no significant influence on bat activity in the mine.