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Posted: 2020-01-06T08:28:40Z | Updated: 2020-01-06T16:52:02Z

Jan 6 (Reuters) - Knitting needles are clicking furiously around the world to create hundreds of protective pouches and blankets for native wildlife made homeless by Australian wildfires that have razed large swathes of bushland.

The Animal Rescue Craft Guild said on Monday it has been deluged with offers of help after putting out a call for volunteers to make bat wraps, joey pouches, birds nests, possum boxes, koala mittens and other snuggly homes for marsupials.

Donations to the volunteer-run group have come in from as far afield as the United States, Britain, Hong Kong, France and Germany.

Its been going crazy, Belinda Orellana, a founding member of the guild, told Reuters. The response has been amazing.

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Blazes across Australia in recent weeks have scorched through 8 million hectares of bushland, an area the size of Austria.

Some experts estimates put the number of animals, including domestic pets and livestock, killed as high as half a billion, with potentially hundreds of thousands of injured and displaced native wildlife.

Its the poor little souls that survived where we come in, said Orellana. Our group creates and supplies items to rescue groups and carers around the country who take in and care for the wildlife.

Orellana said the guild supplied thousands of rescue groups around the country and demand was growing, adding there was an urgent need for fabric donations.

Originally formed a few months ago to make dog and cat beds and coats for animal pounds, the guilds Facebook page has 75,000 members. Many of the crafters have crocheted, knitted and sewed a range of items including koala mittens for burned paws and pouches for infant joey kangaroos who have lost their mothers.