Xref: utzoo sci.bio:1244 sci.misc:1740 misc.consumers.house:2493 rec.gardens:916
Path: utzoo!attcan!uunet!husc6!ukma!rutgers!mtunx!akgua!sortac!wcb
From: wcb@sortac.UUCP (Bill Barksdale)
Newsgroups: sci.bio,sci.misc,misc.consumers.house,rec.gardens
Subject: Re: rabies-infected bats (was Re: Re: Bug zappers)
Message-ID: <261@sortac.UUCP>
Date: 13 Jun 88 16:15:08 GMT
References: <1737@homxb.UUCP> <1020@ih1ap.ATT.COM> <3131@ut-emx.UUCP> <1029@mit-caf.UUCP> <1893@silver.bacs.indiana.edu>
Reply-To: wcb@sortac.UUCP (Bill Barksdale)
Organization: AT&T Southern Region, Atlanta
Lines: 30

In article <1893@silver.bacs.indiana.edu> chiaravi@silver.UUCP (Lucius Chiaraviglio) writes:
>---
>	      I have read (unfortunately I cannot remember the source, but it
>was not a tabloid :-) ) that people have gotten rabies from breathing the air
>in caves with extremely heavy bat populations.  I don't know how long the
>caves remained that heavily populated after that -- it may be that when the
>population of a bat cave gets to a certain point rabies will spread
>explosively through it and decimate it, but I haven't seen any documentation
>on this.
>---


An article from UPI in Sunday's newspaper tells about a zoology prof
who spends a lot of time in caves, studying bats. It describes fairly
elaborate precautions he takes to protect himself from the bat droppings
he invariably encounters on his excursions, including injections for
the rabies virus (no details on what is injected,) because, as the 
article states, the respirator he uses does not filter out this virus.

Conditions around bat houses would be different than in caves, but not
different enough for me - which I think is academic, anyway. I can't
see anybody building a house that bats could be enticed to live in to
the point of making a noticeable reduction in the local bug population.


-- 
       "Even if the wheels fall off, we can SLIDE in from here!"
		- Rick Mears, just before winning the '88 Indy 500

Bill Barksdale        AT&T Network Systems            Atlanta, GA