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I work in film. I’d have to assume so, since the cameras are often very far using long telephoto lenses.

Your definition of “fake” can be a lot of things as the team will record as much audio as they can of of the actual animal (I assume). But the final audio track is a bit like VFX in the visual side - you combine elements from all sources, your recordings, historical recordings, foley audio. Whatever it takes to get the desired effect in the audience.

I wonder. I tend to think so. But then I also think of things like the parabolic sideline microphones at football games and wonder how well they'd work with an amplifier.

Yep! There was an episode of 99 Percent Invisible focusing on the sound design fakery in nature documentaries: https://99percentinvisible.org/episode/sounds-natural/

Coincidentally, it also features the very lemming story that brought us here.