Calum Cunningham

Calum Cunningham writes about how fire reshapes landscapes and societies, drawing on his work as a wildfire scientist. At The Conversation he covers extreme wildfires and wider fire regimes within the environment beat, using current research to explain why recent fire seasons, including those in France and Spain, are “off the charts.” His coverage stands out for treating prominent wildfire events as case studies in long‑term climate and ecological trends rather than one‑off disasters.

Extreme wildfire trends and climate signals

Cunningham’s recent work is anchored in a global analysis of the most extreme wildfires on Earth, which shows that these events have become far more common and intense over the past few decades. As lead author of a Nature Ecology and Evolution study, he quantified how the frequency and intensity of the very worst fires have increased, finding that extreme wildfires are now roughly twice as common worldwide as they were two decades ago. Reporting around that study also highlights that damaging, high‑cost fires are occurring about four times more often than in the 1980s, underlining the pace of change he is focused on. In interviews he has described being alarmed by the rate of increase and has been explicit that human‑driven climate change is making the conditions that produce extreme fires much more frequent.

This research gives his Conversation coverage a clear through‑line: he approaches individual fire seasons as part of a quantified global pattern of escalating extremes. When he explains why particular wildfires are “off the charts,” he draws on metrics of fire behavior and intensity, such as burned area, energy release and duration, rather than treating them as isolated spectacles. His pieces frame climate change not as a vague backdrop but as a measurable driver of hotter, drier conditions that translate directly into more severe and more frequent fire events.

That emphasis on trend data and physical drivers distinguishes his articles from generic environment reporting that might focus primarily on damage tallies or political reaction.

Pyrogeography, landscapes and fire regimes

Cunningham works as a postdoctoral researcher at the University of Tasmania, where he studies how climate change is affecting bushfire regimes and, in turn, ecosystems and societies. His field is pyrogeography, the study of how fire interacts with geography, vegetation and climate across different regions.

In coverage of his work he is described as a pyrogeographer, and his research tracks how fire regimes are changing from coniferous forests in North America to boreal forests at high latitudes. He has documented an elevenfold increase in extreme fires in North American conifer forests since 2003 and a sevenfold increase in extreme events in boreal forests over the same period. These findings show that the strongest signals of change are emerging in already fire‑prone, carbon‑rich biomes, where shifts in fire behavior have outsized consequences for climate and ecosystems.

In his Conversation articles he brings this landscape‑scale view to specific fire stories, explaining why certain regions - such as parts of western Europe or North America - are experiencing unprecedented fire behavior at particular moments.

He connects local events to longer‑term changes in fuel loads, weather patterns and seasonal timing, showing how climate‑driven trends play out differently in Mediterranean shrublands, temperate forests and other systems. His writing typically positions fire within broader earth‑system dynamics, emphasizing global carbon cycles and the role of forests as carbon sinks that are undermined when extreme fires become more common.

That focus on pyrogeography means his coverage is structured around where and how fire occurs, rather than only around who is affected.

Wildlife and ecosystem cascades

Beyond fire behavior, Cunningham’s research background includes work on carnivores, scavenging and invasive species, which informs how he writes about ecological impacts. He has co‑authored studies showing that native apex predators - specifically Tasmanian devils - can limit invasive mesopredators such as feral cats and, by doing so, protect native prey like bandicoots. Other work has examined how disease‑driven declines in Tasmanian devil populations have altered scavenging dynamics, opening more carrion to cats and reshaping food webs.

Taken together, these studies trace how the loss or recovery of key predators can cascade through ecosystems, affecting both native species and invasive pressures.

That ecological lens carries into his environment writing, where fire is not treated only as a physical hazard but as a force that reorganises habitats, species interactions and community resilience. When he discusses changing bushfire regimes, he is equipped to show how shifts in fire frequency and severity interact with predator–prey dynamics, invasive species and disease, rather than isolating fire from broader ecological change.

His coverage therefore tends to integrate climate, fire and biodiversity, highlighting the compound pressures on ecosystems rather than focusing on a single stressor. For communications work around wildfire science, conservation or ecosystem management, his interests sit at the intersection of extreme fire events, landscape‑scale change and wildlife responses.