This helps water and nutrients move throughout your soil, which ultimately helps your garden.

As they scratch for food and build mounds, the birds help break down leaf litter and aerate the soil. Credit: John Martinīut brush-turkeys can benefit the environment. These mounds often cause consternation among avid gardeners and frustrated suburbanites.Ī brush-turkey chick. These mounds can weigh several tons, and can be as wide as 4 meters across and up to 1 meter high. To incubate their eggs, brush-turkeys build enormous mounds of leaf litter and mulch. They're particularly vulnerable to the effects of heavy rain, which can damage or wash out their nests. Or, wait to see if they leave once the rain clears up.īrush turkeys are a type of ground nesting bird found along Australia's east coast, from Cape York in Queensland down to Wollongong in NSW. If you find a fallen bat, do not touch it. If there is consecutive days of rain, bats may fall from their home due to starvation. It also costs a lot more energy for a bat to fly in the rain, making it harder to maintain a steady intake of food. So they'll often stay put in their roosts to keep warm during heavy rain. Many species of microbats, such as the large bent-winged bat, live in culverts and under bridges, where higher water levels can rush through during heavy rain periods.įruit bats, such as flying foxes, don't use echolocation, but rain can wet their fur and lower their body temperature. In Australia, rain may affect microbats more than fruit bats because of where they live. Delayed emergence can lead to disorientated bats with a reduced capacity to find food. In 2019, Smithsonian researchers played recordings of downpours near bat roosts, and found the bats delayed emerging from their roosts. giving a smile (this bat was handled by a gloved, trained professional. They use echolocation to see, but heavy rain likely reduces this ability. Microbats are abundant throughout Australian cities. In torpor, bats will sleep more and lower their body temperature so they can use less energy. They can respond to periods of heavy rain by using a special physiological adaptation called torpor. But bats are often forgotten for their ability to control insect pests, disperse seeds, and pollinate plants.īats face some serious threats in La Niña conditions. They're typically considered nuisances for their noise, mess and potential spread of diseases. Here's what makes them so fascinating and important to your neighborhood.Īustralia is home to multiple threatened species of fruit bats and microbats, such as gray-headed flying foxes, large bent-wing bats, and spectacled flying foxes. They're also crucial members of our urban ecosystems, and help keep the environment healthy. We often think of them as pests, but these animals are just trying their best to cope in the heavy rain.

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