Zee Media Bureau/Salome Phelamei

Casper (Wyoming): Of all the 15 bat species that live in Wyoming, one could be listed as endangered due to the threats it faces outside of the state.

Wyoming is the 10th most extensive, but the least populous and the second least densely populated of the 50 United States.

Earlier this month, the US Fish and Wildlife Service had announced a proposal to list the northern long-eared bat as endangered as the populations of the bat in the eastern United States have been devastated by a disease called white-nose syndrome.

“A possible listing will probably have limited effects on land activities in Wyoming”, said Bob Oakleaf, non-game coordinator for the Wyoming Game and Fish Department.

Relatively few of the bats live in Wyoming, and the closest documented cases of white-nose syndrome are in Minnesota and eastern Oklahoma.

While the fungus has not yet been identified in Wyoming, it has been said that about 5.5 million bats have been killed in the US and Canada due to white-nose syndrome.