The answer is adaptation and old-fashioned ingenuity.
Australias bushfire season is far from over, and the cost to wildlife has been epic.
Asobering estimatehas put the number of animals killed across eastern Australia at 480 million and thats a conservative figure.
In nearby enclosures, ten sleepy lizards, orTiliqua rugosa, began pacing and rapidly flicking their tongues.
But sleepy lizards in rooms unaffected by smoke remained burrowed and calm.
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So the lizards were responding as they would to a bushfire.
In Australia, experiments have shown smoke also awakensGoulds long-eared batsandfat-tailed dunnarts, enabling their escape from fire.
Animals also recognize the distinct sounds of fire.
Reed frogsflee towards coverand eastern-red bats wake from torporwhen played the crackling sounds of fire.
Other species detect fire for different reasons.
They can detect fire chemicalsat very low concentrations, as well as infrared radiation from fires.
Stay or go?
Once an animal becomes aware of an approaching fire, its decision time: stay or go?
Other animals prefer to stay put, seeking refuge in burrows or under rocks.
Smaller animals will happilycrash a wombat burrowif it means surviving a fire.
Burrows buffer animals from the heat of fires, depending on their depth and nearbyfuel loads.
From here, animals canrepopulate the charred landscape as it recovers.
One US studypublished in 2017 recorded a seven-fold increase in raptor activity during fire.
They begin hunting as the fires burn, andhang around for weeks or months to capitalize on vulnerable prey.
Feral cats can travel kilometers in search of vulnerable prey in a burnt-out landscape.
HUGH MCGREGOR
In Australia, introduced predators can also be drawn to fires.
Red foxes have anaffinity for burned areas too.
So should a little critter hunker down, or begin the hazardous search for a new home?
This might allow some mammal populations to recover from within a fire footprint.
Native mammals have been foundhiding in beds of ashafter fires.
Some animals can flee a fireground, while others use bush-smarts to stay put.
Animals might take short, information-gathering missions from their refuges into the fireground before embarking on a risky trek.
A dead bird at a Victorian property on January 4, 2019.
The ecological toll of the bushfires is immense.
We still have a lot to learn about how Australias wildlife detects and responds to fire.
Filling in the knowledge gaps might lead to new ways of helping wildlife adapt to our rapidly changing world.
