It is so hot, birds are abandoning the sky.

Hours after Australia set a record for its warmest day across the continent, with even hotter temperatures in the near forecast, Greg Marshall, a garden designer in Adelaide, said he had found birds of different species gathered on the ground Wednesday, under the shade of trees.

It was 106 degrees.

“I’ve been walking around the parklands, turning on the taps at the bottom of the trees,” he said. The birds — “with their beaks open, all gasping for air,” he said — huddled around the faucets, trying to get a drink.

A national heat wave, triggered by a confluence of meteorological factors that extends well beyond Australia’s shores, pushed high temperatures across the country on Tuesday to an average of 105.6 degrees, or 40.9 degrees Celsius, breaking the record of 104.5, or 40.3 Celsius, set on Jan. 7, 2013.