A year after Australia’s wildfires, extinction threatens hundreds of species
More than 500 species may now be endangered — or extinct — due to the natural disaster
Glossy black-cockatoos (pictured) on Australia’s Kangaroo Island are one species that weathered the country’s 2019–2020 wildfires thanks to a great fledgling year.
Andrew Peacock/iStock/Getty Images Plus
When Isabel Hyman heads out in coming weeks to the wilds of northern New South Wales, she’s worried about what she won’t find. Fifteen years ago, the malacologist — or mollusk scientist — with the Australian Museum made an incredible discovery among the limestone outcrops there: a tiny, 3-millimeter-long snail, with a ribbed, dark golden-brown shell, that was new to science.