When a small head peeked out of a box among the gum trees at Tallaganda National Park in the state’s south-west, ecologist Kita Ashman was overcome with emotion.

It was the first sign that high-tech nest boxes were working, and that families of the endangered greater gliders were moving in, after their habitat was devastated by bushfires three years ago.

“I just burst into tears,” she said. “I was so surprised and happy. Seeing greater gliders using the boxes after only 10 weeks was joyous.”

Tree hollows, the gliders’ natural choice of home, take more than 80 years to form. A third of that real estate was burned down in the 2019-20 bushfires, sending glider numbers plummeting from normal to endangered by July this year.

Their human-made retreats, called “goldilocks” nest boxes, have a much shorter construction timeframe, but prompted many challenges.

Australian National University PhD student Jenna Ridley said, “setting up this project was a mammoth effort with so many moving parts”.

As the frequency and severity of heatwaves increases with climate change, gliders have become especially sensitive to warmer temperatures.

To keep them cool in warm temperatures and warm in cool temperatures, the boxes were fitted with insulation, air gaps, and heat-reflective, fire-resistant, non-toxic coatings.

In February and April, about 120 of these boxes were installed in fire-affected forests in NSW and 114 were placed in East Gippsland, Victoria.