Wing and a prayer: how probiotics might save bat species from a killer fungus

Bat experts were shocked at how fast white-nose syndrome had spread to Canada’s northernmost colonies from the US. Now, the race is on to find a cure before species disappear

Crawling through a narrow passage in a cave beneath a boreal forest near Fort Smith in Canada’s Northwest Territories in May, two biologists spotted a lifeless bat on a limestone ledge, its body covered in a spindly white fungus.

When they shone their headlamps to get a closer look, they saw another bat with the fungus on its forearms. “It hissed at us and crawled back into a crack,” Jesika Reimer says.