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Kitchen Table Kibitzing 11/26/25: Extinction is Forever [1]

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Date: 2025-11-26  

7 years ago the population of Australian spectacled flying foxes experienced a climate holocaust.

Over two days in November, record-breaking heat in Australia's north wiped out almost one-third of the nation's spectacled flying foxes, according to researchers. The animals, also known as spectacled fruit bats, were unable to survive in temperatures which exceeded 42C. In the city of Cairns, locals saw bats toppling from trees into backyards, swimming pools and other locations. Wildlife rescuers found surviving animals clumped together, usually on branches closer to the ground. "It was totally depressing," one rescuer, David White, told the BBC.

Between 33,000 and 40,000 of the bats perished in the heat. Our impact on the climate is killing them off.

In the last two decades tens of thousands of Australian flying foxes have died during extreme heat events.[1] Flying fox die-offs feature arguably among the most dramatic mass mortality events witnessed in nature, but they can be indicators of heat stress in more cryptic fauna where impacts are more difficult to assess. The die-offs are important additional threats to Australian flying-foxes and the ecosystem services they provide, and highlight the complex implications of climate change for behaviour, demography, and species survival.

These bats are endangered.

Unfortunately the U.S. does not have a monopoly on stupidity.

Some experts worry that public antipathy to bats may hinder conservation efforts. This is usually related to fears about contracting diseases from bats, and their noise in urban areas. This week, amid a heatwave in New South Wales, authorities warned people against approaching bats due to reports of aggression. "They're seen as these rats in the sky, so any preservation effort is hard going," Dr Westcott says. "You can bet there were some people glad to see so many bats go down in the heatwave."

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