Flying foxes face threats from habitat destruction, culling, and mass mortality during heat waves, with urban colonies increasingly coming into conflict with human communities.
Flying fox welfare crises occur most dramatically during heat waves when temperatures exceed their thermal tolerance. Distressed bats become immobile, fall from trees, and die from heat stroke over hours in visible anguish. Surviving pups abandoned by heat-stressed mothers face starvation without rescue intervention. Culling operations using firearms wound many more bats than are killed cleanly, with injured animals experiencing prolonged suffering before death or rescue. The combination of these stressors represents significant individual welfare costs for populations in decline.