property with gray bat caves should be educated about gray bats and potentially harmful activities. Finally, the US Fish and Wildlife Service recognized the need for continuing research from the scientific community to further understand human impact on this vulnerable species. As of 2022, 70% of significant summer roosting sites and 14 of the 15 major hibernacula are considered permanently protected by a variety of means, affording year-round protection for the majority of the known population. Legal status In the western portion of the range of M. grisescens, from 1978 to 2002, M. grisescens populations at 21 of 48 (44%) maternity caves showed a significantly increasing trend, 17 (35%) had no trend, and 10 (21%) were decreasing. A study in 2003 attempted a species-wide assessment in gray bat summer cave populations. This study found that of 76 maternity colonies, 3 (4%) were increasing, 66 (87%) had no discernible trends, and 7 (9%) had decreasing trends. The Endangered Species Act requires that 90% of the most important hibernacula be protected and that populations at 75% of the most important maternity colonies be stable or increasing over a period of 5 years for the gray bat to be down-listed from endangered to threatened status. Because the range of the gray bat is so vast, and sampling techniques so varied and incomplete (thus data is somewhat unreliable when attempting to do species-wide census), gray bats are unlikely to be downgraded in the near future, but total population size has rebounded by ~104% between the 1980s and 2004 (from 1.6 to 3.4 million). After 37 years without a single documented gray bat within the state boundaries of Mississippi, on September 20, 2004, a male gray bat was discovered in Tishomingo County in northeastern Mississippi, 42 km south of the last known location of M. grisescens before their decline and disappearance within the state of Mississippi. (Before this 2004 discovery, the only known gray bats lived at a site known as Chalk Mine, located in the northeastern portion of the county. Gray bats had last been documented at Chalk Mine in 1967.) Extensive human disturbance, including the presence of trash, smoke, and graffiti, is believed to have affected the use of the Chalk Mine by bats. While the discovery of this bat is deemed as a positive sign by conservationists, it is possible that the bat was not from a Mississippi M. grisescens population. The