Corynorhinus townsendii (Cooper, 1837)

D, K D., M, M B., M, M L., P, B L., S, J M., E, J W. & A, L K., 2017, N R S S B 13 T C F V S S P, Occasional Papers of the Museum 351, pp. 1-12 : 3-5

Corynorhinus townsendii (Cooper, 1837)

Townsend’s Big-eared Bat

Townsend’s Big-eared Bat has a distributional range that extends throughout the entire western United States and has two disjunct subspecies populations in the Ozark and Appalachian Mountains. Corynorhinus townsendii is a year-round resident of Texas and has been documented from six ecoregions (Central Great Plains, Southwestern Tablelands, High Plains, Edwards Plateau, Chihuahuan Desert, and Arizona / New Mexico Mountains). Although Piaggio and Perkins (2005) indicated that C. t. australis was the only subspecies in Texas, this conclusion was based on limited sampling in Texas (one site). More recently, two subspecies (C. t. pallescens and C. t. australis ) have been confirmed in the state ( Smith et al. 2008; Tipps 2012). Although not found in Texas, the endangered Virginia Big-eared Bat ( Corynorhinus townsendii virginianus ) has been documented as a carrier of P. destructans (www. 7. Burnet

Figure 1. Map depicting 13 counties in Texas where bats were observed or collected during roost site surveys between November 2016 and March 2017. whitenosesyndrome.org). We recently reported the first documentation of C. t. pallescens as a subspecies on which the fungus has been detected, but no diagnostic signs of WNS have been observed (Meierhofer et al. in prep).

King County.—On 2 December 2016, two C. townsendii were observed roosting in a cave system 26.1 km southeast of Paducah, Texas. An adult female C. townsendii (ASNHC 18118, ASK 12675) was collected as a voucher specimen. This specimen represents a new county record for the species, and tested negative for the DNA of P. destructans . Although separate, the cave system in which these individuals were observed is located within 50 m of a cave housing M. velifer that have been reported as positive carriers of the P. destructans fungal spores. Townsend’s Big-eared Bats were observed lying between these two cave sites.

Scurry County.—An adult male C. townsendii (ASNHC 18119, ASK 12676) was collected on 5 December 2017 from a gypsum cave system 27.7 km northeast of Snyder, Texas. In total, 57 C. townsendii were observed during survey efforts in Scurry County. Although this voucher specimen was P. destructans negative, two other C. townsendii that were swabbed at the site were positive for P. destructans . A public observation (Chris Taylor, pers. comm.) in 2000 served as the first historic mention of C. townsendii in Scurry County, but was not officially documented. Therefore, this voucher specimen is considered to be the first veri- fied county record for C. townsendii in Scurry County.