Posted on 06/25/2002 12:35:12 PM PDT by D'Adamo
Bats will receive new 700-acre home
New I-70 interchange will destroy old habitat and likely kill some of the endangered animals.
By George McLaren
george.mclaren@indystar.com
June 25, 2002
A new highway interchange on I-70 near Plainfield will wipe out 350 acres of habitat for the endangered Indiana bat and probably kill off several of the nocturnal mammals.
That's the bat news.
The good news: A formal plan announced Monday will result in permanent protection for more than 700 acres of wooded habitat and help guarantee a summer home for hundreds of bats in the future.
The habitat conservation plan, negotiated among several local, state and federal agencies, will also allow economic development to continue around Indianapolis International Airport and let the midfield terminal project move forward.
"It's truly win-win," said William Hartwig, regional director for the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, which enforces the federal Endangered Species Act.
Taxpayers will foot the $5.5 million cost of the project, with the Indianapolis Airport Authority paying nearly half and the state and city kicking in the rest.
That includes almost $3.5 million for Indiana State University researchers to monitor the bat population for 15 years. Additional costs include $500,000 for new land purchases, plus the cost of planting about 170,000 tree seedlings to create bat habitat in decades to come.
The Indiana bat population, which once numbered more than a million, has dwindled to 380,000 since the 1960s. Half of the entire population hibernates in caves in the southern part of the state, then spreads out into maternity colonies in the warm months.
The local colony was discovered near the airport in the early 1990s during an expansion project. Currently, about 150 bats -- 75 females and their single offspring -- spend the summers in the project area.
The night fliers require mature woods; they roost during the day under the bark of dead or dying trees and forage for insects at night.
Since they are protected by the Endangered Species Act, any significant change to habitat requires approval from the Fish and Wildlife Service.
Without the new conservation plan, every new development stage could require new federal approval, said John Kish, project director for the airport authority.
"This streamlines the project immensely," Kish added. "We had this entire review for all potential habitat sites."
Other partners also praised the plan.
"It's possible to preserve our environment and move forward on economic development at the same time," said Barbara Lawrence, director of the city's Department of Public Works.
But federal biologists acknowledge that destruction of existing bat habitat will have a negative impact at first. Some bats will die after they return from hibernation sites and discover their former summer habitat gone.
"They arrive hungry and pregnant. They've been in a cave all winter, and there's nowhere to go," said Scott Pruitt of the Fish and Wildlife Service.
If the bats attempt to move to new territory, they likely will get into conflicts with bats already there, he added. Fetuses may be aborted, or the adult bats will starve or succumb to disease in their weakened state.
"I'd say five to 10 (bats will die). It could be more. It could be less," Pruitt said.
But in the long term, increasing habitat and consolidating it into a contiguous block will offer the bat population protection.
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