Bamboo May Spread Hantavirus by Encouraging Seed-Eating Mice

Bamboo may be spreading hantavirus. Scientists have discovered that with the plant's prolific seed production, there's a boom among seed-eating deer mice that carry the disease.

Bamboo plants are growing in popularity, judging by the increased number of species listed by the American Bamboo Society. Some grow in relatively self-contained clumps while other so-called "running bamboos" can spread rapidly by underground stems called rhizomes. This makes the bamboo difficult to contain.

Bamboo have extremely intermittent flowering cycles. When they do flower, or mast, they produce huge amounts of seeds over as many as 18 months. During this time, deer mice can undergo several reproductive cycles and when the seed is gone, these animals will look for other food sources in and around human homes.

More than one in 10 deer mice carry hantavirus. This is spread through contact with their urine, droppings, or contaminated dust. People who catch the disease usually have a few days of flu-like symptoms followed by respiratory and pulmonary complications. Currently, there are population booms of these mice in Asia and South America during bamboo masting events.

"We contend that a substantial risk of a similar sequence could arise in North America due to the rapid proliferation and expansion of non-native running bamboos within the range of P. maniculatus," said Richard Mack, one of the researchers, in a news release.

In fact, the researchers recommend a change in U.S. and Canadian plant quarantine policies to eradicate aggressively spreading non-native bamboo on public lands. In addition, regulators should consider evaluating bamboo plants' flowering intervals and seed palatability before letting them into the U.S.

The findings are published in the journal PLOS One.

For more great science stories and general news, please visit our sister site, Headlines and Global News (HNGN).