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Fungus vs snakes

Discussion in 'Environmental Discussion' started by bwilson4web, Dec 22, 2017.

  1. bwilson4web

    bwilson4web BMW i3 and Model 3

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    Earlier this week, someone mentioned how much she hates copperheads, a poisonous snake. Although I expressed some sympathy to her point of view, I didn't volunteer the importance of snakes in rodent control. Now it appears there may be an extinction mechanism: Host susceptibility to snake fungal disease is highly dispersed across phylogenetic and functional trait space | Science Advances

    Emerging fungal diseases have devastating effects on wildlife abundance and species diversity (1). Among terrestrial vertebrates, these fungal diseases have commonly been recorded in amphibians (2, 3), bats (4), and now snakes [snake fungal disease (SFD) caused by Ophidiomyces ophidiodiicola] (5, 6). The origins of these diseases and their effect on physiology, population demography, species loss, rates of colonization, and community assembly are important for mitigating their impacts on wildlife. Although it is immediately important to generate a list of susceptible taxa, unfortunately, predictions about how widespread particular diseases are across the tree of life are generally not well understood, likely owing to the time and expertise to survey broad regions and sample taxa with low encounter rates (7–9). Within amphibians and bats, the host range of fungal diseases affecting these groups may appear ecologically and taxonomically random at broad geographic and phylogenetic scales; however, nonrandom ecological and phylogenetic patterns have been reported locally (10–14). The broad host range exhibited by fungal pathogens is believed to play a major role in the catastrophic effects they can have on host communities (1). Understanding host ecological and evolutionary diversity is also complicated by cases where the same taxon may respond uniquely across different areas, given the timing of the disease invasion and environmental heterogeneity (15).
    . . . ​

    The "Black Death" decimated and depopulated huge areas of Europe (and probably other areas.) The "Spanish flu" was another pandemic but with the exception of rare, remote communities, didn't depopulate regions. Both are well identified pathogens, bacteria and virus. But new to me, a fungus as a vector for snake extinction?

    Per Wiki, chitin in the cell wall identifies a fungus. These are just Google/Wiki reads and organic chemistry was not something I studied. Still, I am sympathetic to the fungal risk: Fungal Diseases Homepage | CDC

    In current events, hurricane associated flooding converted a lot of Texas homes into fungal cultures. So sometimes I wonder how forest investigators mitigate fungal risks besides "don't eat what you study?"

    Still, I see the utility of snake and bats (i.e., white nose) and have some sympathy for the risk they face.

    Bob Wilson
     
    #1 bwilson4web, Dec 22, 2017
  2. tochatihu

    tochatihu Senior Member

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    fungus as a vector for snake extinction?

    It is not impossible but knowledge is severely limited. For snakes I suppose that fossil interpretation of species (and extinctions) is severely incomplete. I do not know that. Recognition of snake fungal disease seems recent (like a decade) but this does not prove it is a new thing.

    For other critters. Fungal disease in amphibians and bats have both also popped up recently. In amphibians there is evidence for environmental changes playing a role.

    chitin in the cell wall identifies a fungus

    Chitin cell walls in fungi, insects, and broadly across crustaceans. Better ways exist to know that you are looking at a fungus. Ergosterol is a 'decoration' of fungal cell walls. Extract from some bulk sample, do some chemistry, then pop it into your gas chromatograph. Shows how much fungal biomass was in that sample. Works well except when it doesn't.

    I see the utility of snake and bats

    Um, so what? I mean that in the kindest possible way. They may or may not 'see' a utility in humans, again, so what?

    Snakes and bats provide human-perceived ecosystem services. I suppose such rarely figure into land-use decisions and things like that. Our conceit is to suppose was can replace services with sufficiently clever chemicals. Well, maybe.

    ==
    Fungus studied here seems to do fine as saprotroph (means organic-matter decomposer) in soils. May be very widely distributed. If the fungi or snakes are changing in pathenogenicity or sensitivity, it might be a bad time to be a snake.

    ==
    Y'know I usta really like zoos. Now I mostly see them as prisons for those not proven guilty. Sure, zoos can play major roles in species conservation. For example all Sumatran rhinos except one are in zoos, and that one will die. Like tomorrow or something.

    But zoos have another aspect. They confine animals that would not live each other, in close proximity. Zoo keepers (with best of intentions) move among the inmates and could transfer diseases. When diseases jump among host species (and they do) zoos could turn out to be a very bad idea.

    Similar could be said for botanical gardens :eek: A place for diseases to jump among plant species normally living on opposite sides of this planet. Don't see them as prisons though. Mobility of individual plants is not a design feature..
     
    #2 tochatihu, Dec 22, 2017
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  3. tochatihu

    tochatihu Senior Member

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    For me the interesting thing about chitin in cell walls is presence of nitrogen. One N per 8 carbons. Suggests that chitinous ones are not under dire nitrogen limitation

    Bacteria also have N in cell walls; slightly different package. Actually two types that vastly differ and that you have heard of. Gram positive and Gram negative.

    Plants do not. Cell wall 1.0 is cellulose, a sugar polymer. Cell wall 2.0 includes lignin which is not sugar at all. It is a haphazard jumble of rings that usta be the amino acid phenylalanine. But clever plants snip off that N and keep it inside.

    ==
    Fish. Most fish make bones out of protein. Not calcium like bony us (etc.) Faintly suggests there is more N than Ca in their world.
     
    #3 tochatihu, Dec 22, 2017
  4. tochatihu

    tochatihu Senior Member

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    #4 tochatihu, Dec 22, 2017
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