A bat named for its ears
The northern myotis, also called the northern long-eared bat, carries ears noticeably longer than most of its close relatives. That feature helped give it the name. Through summer it hunts insects in the cluttered space beneath a forest canopy, gleaning prey off leaves and bark as often as catching it in open air. That technique fits its ears and slower, more maneuverable flight better than the open-sky chases favored by many other bats.
A range built on forest and cold caves
Confirmed records span 14 states, from Nebraska and the Great Lakes east through New York and Pennsylvania down into the Appalachians and North Carolina. Ohio and Pennsylvania carry the largest documented counts, while North Carolina and Washington, DC register only a handful each. That range traces a species tied to two very different habitats across the year. It keeps wooded summer roosts under loose bark or in cavities, then hibernates through winter in cool, humid caves or abandoned mines.
Hit especially hard by a cold-loving disease
White-nose syndrome, a fungal disease that thrives in the cold, damp conditions of hibernation caves, has spread through the eastern United States since it first appeared in 2006. Few bats have suffered more from it than this one. The IUCN now lists the northern myotis as Near Threatened, a step most American bat species have not needed. Where the fungus has hit hardest, recent records thin out sharply. A gap in the record can reflect reduced survey effort in hard-to-reach hibernation sites just as easily as a real local loss.
Two habitats to protect, not one
Because this species depends equally on summer forest and winter cave shelter, protecting it means safeguarding both halves of that cycle rather than either alone. Undisturbed hibernation sites limit the disturbance that can push already-weakened bats past a critical energy threshold in winter. Intact forest with old, loose-barked trees keeps summer roosts available. Tracking real change here means watching hibernation-site counts over years, not reading a single season’s records as a population estimate.
