In the 1980s, Dick Eussen, a fire crew chief at Kakadu National Park in northern Australia, witnessed an unusual phenomenon while attempting to stop a grassland fire from crossing a road. As he approached a new ignition point, a whistling kite flew past carrying a smoldering branch in its talons, dropping it onto dry grass and sparking a new blaze. That afternoon, Eussen extinguished seven such new fires caused by approximately 25 kites circling the area, with two individuals appearing particularly skilled at transporting burning material. These birds are known as Australian firehawks, a term encompassing three raptor species: the black kite, the whistling kite, and the brown falcon.
These raptors maintain a close relationship with fire, gathering around flames to hunt grasshoppers, small reptiles, and rodents fleeing the heat. While inexperienced birds sometimes singe their feathers by flying too close, indigenous communities in northern Australia have long reported that some of these birds intentionally carry burning branches to unburnt areas to spread the fire. A 2017 study collected testimonies from 12 Aboriginal groups, firefighters, and land managers, describing birds carrying embers across barriers like roads and watercourses over distances of hundreds of meters. Although this behavior is part of traditional ceremonies and knowledge, researchers have yet to capture definitive photographic or video evidence, leaving the frequency of such events unknown.
If these observations are accurate, they suggest that humans may not be the only animals capable of manipulating fire for their benefit. Beyond the firehawks, other species arrive while fires are still active. One notable example is Melanophila acuminata, a small dark beetle belonging to a group known as pyrophiles, or "fire lovers." For these insects, a wildfire signals an ideal location for reproduction rather than a threat. Adults gather around forest fires, and once the flames pass, females lay eggs under the bark of burnt trees. The larvae then develop in wood where tree defenses have failed, feeding on the recently dead or weakened timber.
These beetles locate fires by detecting smoke compounds with their antennae and possess specialized sensory pits on either side of their thorax containing receptors sensitive to infrared radiation. This allows them to orient themselves toward heat sources without getting too close to the flames. The arrival of these insects sets the stage for the next phase of the ecological cycle. Weeks or months later, predators such as the black-backed woodpecker in North American forests begin to appear. These birds climb charred trunks and excavate the wood to feed on the large beetle larvae hidden beneath the bark.
As weeks pass and new grass begins to sprout from the blackened earth, herbivores enter the scene. The fire removes old vegetation and opens the ground, promoting nutrient-rich young shoots. In the Serengeti, researchers observed that small herbivores like Grant's gazelle are the first to arrive, feeding on the initial green carpet. As the grass grows taller and older, larger herbivores such as buffalo move in, tolerating the lower nutritional quality of the maturing vegetation due to their lower energy requirements per kilogram of body weight. Ecologists refer to this interaction between fire and large herbivores as pyric herbivory.
The wildfire acts as a disturbance that temporarily reorganizes the ecosystem, functioning like a relay race where different species take turns exploiting the changing conditions. Evolution has allowed species to coexist with fires for hundreds of millions of years, learning to detect opportunities left in their wake. However, this adaptation does not prepare animals for all types of fire. Factors such as frequency, intensity, seasonality, and the availability of unburnt refuges are critical. In recent years, exceptionally large and frequent fires have emerged that may exceed the conditions under which these dependent species evolved.
Sources: El País Ciencia.