Australian fires have incinerated the habitats of up to 100 threatened species
Until last week, the Kangaroo Island glossy black cockatoo was one of Australia’s conservation success stories. Thanks to a recovery program that began in 1995, its wild population increased from 150 to 400, and its status was downgraded from critically endangered to endangered. Now it’s part of an unfolding horror story. Fires have raged across nearly 50 percent of Kangaroo Island, a 4,400-square-kilometer isle off the coast of the state of South Australia, destroying the habitat of the great majority of the birds. It’s unclear how many glossy black cockatoos (Calyptorhynchus lathami halmaturinus) survived. For those that escaped the flames, food may be scarce; it eats the seeds of single tree species in its habitat, the drooping she oak. Many years of hard work have gone up in smoke and “it’s a big step backwards for the recovery team,” says Daniella Teixeira, a conservation biologist at the University of Queensland in Brisbane, Australia, who has studied and worked to protect the birds for the...