[OKC] From NY Times: The Dollars and Cents of Bats and Farming

[Miles, Karen]

The Dollars and Cents of Bats and Farming

Putting a dollar value on nature and the services it provides isn't
easy. Such numbers can show how much our human economy depends on
nature's indiscernible economy. Take bats. A study in Science magazine
reveals just how important they are to American agriculture. 
Every day, a bat eats much of its body weight in insects, many of them
harmful to crops. A group of scientists led by Thomas Kunz at Boston
University calculated how much more money cotton farmers in one region
of Texas would spend on pesticides if bats weren't present.
Extrapolating from those numbers, they estimated that bats save American
farmers somewhere between $3.7 billion and $54 billion a year, most
likely about $22.9 billion. 
This is a huge savings no one notices as long as bats flourish. But bat
populations are severely threatened, especially the commonest species,
the little brown bat, which is being decimated by a fungal disease
called white-nose syndrome. The disease has spread all across the
eastern half of the country and is now moving westward from Oklahoma. 
Article continues at: 
http://www.nytimes.com/2011/04/05/opinion/05tue3.html?nl=todaysheadlines
&emc=tha211
 
 
 
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