Data from: Modelling the potential efficacy of treatments for white-nose syndrome in bats

<p class="western">1. The fungal disease white-nose syndrome (WNS) has caused mass mortality in some species of North American bats during hibernation. </p> <p class="western">2. We use population viability models to test if a hypothetical WNS treatment or management action could facilitate the recovery of WNS-affected little brown myotis (<i>Myotis lucifugus</i>) populations. We modelled scenarios altering three parameters: (1) WNS severity (population growth rate of WNS-affected populations; λ_WNS); (2) proportion of population treated; and (3) treatment improvement in winter survival (TIWS). </p> <p class="western">3. Our models predict that a treatment or management action that targets an entire population with a TIWS of 40% (the average TIWS in bat trials to date) will cause a population to stabilize or increase if WNS causes an annual decline of less than 70% (i.e. λ_WNS&gt;=0.30). However, for severe WNS (λ_WNS=0.10), the TIWS must be at least 54% to cause the population to stabilize or increase. Where only a proportion of a WNS-affected population is treated, population stability is much harder to achieve unless the impact of WNS attenuates over time.</p> <p class="western">4. Our models suggest that a treatment or management action only facilitates the recovery of WNS-affected populations if WNS is mild, a large proportion of bats can be treated, TIWS is high, and/or WNS severity attenuates over time.</p> <p class="western"><span>5. </span><i>Synthesis and applications</i><i><span>.</span></i><span> We mode</span><span><span>lled</span></span><span> the predicted abundance trajectory of white-nose syndrome (WNS)-affected little brown myotis (</span><i><span>Myotis lucifugus</span></i><span>) populations </span><span><span>in response to hypothetical treatment or management actions. Our two types of models incorporate the complete range of possible scenarios varying three parameters: (1) population growth rate of the WNS-affected population</span></span><span><span>, (2) the improvement in winter </span></span><span><span>survival associated with the </span></span><span><span>treatment or management action, and (3) the proportion of the population treated. </span></span><span><span><span><span>We suggest that our models, which can be explored using online Shiny applications, should be used in the planning phase of treatment or management action programs for WNS.</span></span></span></span></p>