Natural History

Posted in wildlife, wolves | Tagged marsupials, Tasmanian tiger, Tasmanian wolves, thylacine | 31 Comments

31 Responses

1. on January 13, 2010 at 5:36 am Jess

   These guys are awesome. Have you been to this site:

   http://www.naturalworlds.org/thylacine/

   Lots of info and footage. Also very interesting dentition comparisons with wolves.

   
   
   • on January 13, 2010 at 2:19 pm retrieverman

     I love that site.

     
     
2. on January 13, 2010 at 2:26 pm bill

   Totally awesome. Mother nature is a mad scientist. Are we 100% sure that there aren’t a few more of these guys still hiding deep in the outback? I think i would rather find one of these than a bigfoot.

   BTW-Is bitch the proper term for a female thylacine?

   
   
   • on January 13, 2010 at 2:35 pm retrieverman

     If any of these cryptozoological mysteries exists, it is this animal.

     There have been lots and lots of sightings on Tasmania and the mainland. The ones on the mainland could be mangy dogs, foxes, dingoes, and dingo crosses, but in Tasmania, well, they could still be there.

     They did try to clone one from a joey that was preserved in alcohol a few years back, but it was far too expensive.

     
     
3. on January 13, 2010 at 3:03 pm Peggy Richter

   IIRC, the thylacine was found to be most closely related to the Tas “devil”. The thylacine was originally on both the mainland and on the Tasmanian island, but went extinct on the mainland along with several other “megafauna” of Australia. It’s interesting to speculate that the thylacine on the mainland might have been killed by the same kind of communicable disease as is now killing off the Devils. It appears that the cancer originated with dogs then passed on to Devils so it’s very possible that a similar cancer (or even the same one) was brought in by Dingos and took out both Devils and Thylacines on the mainland.

   The arguement about thylacines being on the mainland is based on an attempted reintroduction — in which case, like Britians’ “big cats”, they might have established themselves in the wild after release. I would love for this to be true, but suspect it’s more a case of “bigfoot”. Darren Nash discussed this a while back on his Tetrapod zoology blog.

   VR, Peggy Richter.

   
   
   • on January 13, 2010 at 3:20 pm retrieverman

     The origin of the “tumour” disease.

     http://www.nytimes.com/2010/01/01/science/01devil.html

     The ones on Tasmania might be real. The ones the mainland are probably foxes or dingoes/dogs/dingo-dog crosses.

     
     
   • on January 13, 2010 at 9:56 pm retrieverman

     A recent study showed that Thylacines are almost as closely related to numbats (and look at numbat before you say anythiing) as they are to Tasmanian Devils and quolls:

     http://genome.cshlp.org/content/early/2009/01/12/gr.082628.108

     
     
4. on January 13, 2010 at 5:46 pm Lane Batot

   If they try and clone any extinct animal from DNA, as they are proposing to try with Woolly Mammoths(as on “60 Minutes” this past Sunday), thylacines would be my vote, and would seem very possible–lots more of their DNA in museums than Woolly Mammoths(although I’d love to see mammoths brought back, too!)…L.B.

   
   
5. on January 14, 2010 at 2:38 am HTTrainer

   When there is a very good chance that 1/3 of the species that exist today will become extinct, why are we trying to clone those that are already lost? Discretionary spendable income is something wonderful to have. Wouldn’t these funds be better spent trying to save a species that is on the endangered/threatened list?

   
   
   • on January 14, 2010 at 2:49 am retrieverman

     Your argument is exactly why they stopped trying to clone the thylacine. Quolls are almost extinct. Devils have a contagious tumor disease.

     And we’re spending tons of money on cloning the thylacine.

     
     
6. on January 14, 2010 at 10:20 am Russell Constable

   We had them, we lost them,we were stupid.
   In Tasmania the bounty increased as the numbers dropped, a brilliant policy if you want to stomp a species with continued hunting pressure.
   I month after the last animal in captivity died the Tasmanian Government declared the Thylacine a protected species and offered a reward for a replacement.
   Too little too late.
   They were dreaming.
   David Quammen writes about them very nicely in the book “Song of the Dodo”
   PS There are stories of New Guinea tribes seeing this animal in recent times.

   
   
   • on January 14, 2010 at 1:50 pm retrieverman

     I read something by Stephen Wroe that the thylacine was weakened by habitat loss, hunting, and what really hurt it, a distemper-like disease.

     Wroe postulates that it may have been disease that killed off the thylacine on the mainland– disease brought the dogs that became dingoes.

     
     
     • on January 15, 2010 at 6:35 am Russell Constable

       Quammen hits it on the head when he said that they were never a common animal to begin with when Europeans arrived in Tasmania. Scarcity is the precursor to extinction he says and I must agree. A distemper like disease apparently knocked the Dickins out of the remaining animals. Oops I should have said relative scarcity and that covers me then for your (ex)Passenger pigeon!There was a black and white video on youtube of the last captive Thylacine in Tassie and it was probably then loneliest animal on the planet.

       
       
7. on January 14, 2010 at 8:10 pm Jackal73

   There are persistant rumors of sightings in remote parts of Tasmania. While I would love it if they hadn’t been wiped out, I doubt the sightings are more than someone seeing something the can’t immediately identify and calling thylacine.

   Sadly the best chance of survival for this species (assuming it’s not completely extinct) is if it isn’t rediscovered. In the last wild sighting (that I’m aware of) the man who saw a female and young set his dogs on them.

   
   
8. on April 27, 2010 at 5:39 am ray

   can u put up photos of prints , if u can i will send u 2 but only if u put them up . i will not tell where i got them, u can say whatever u want about them , i know they are thylacine.

   
   
   • on April 27, 2010 at 8:35 am retrieverman

     Yes. I can put up photos of prints. I’ll put them up without commentary to see what my readers think.

     http://www.tassietiger.org/gallery/displayimage.php?album=3&pos=2

     I think that if any of these things exist, it is this animal.

     
     
   • on April 27, 2010 at 8:36 am retrieverman

     Here’s my e-mail: retrieverman1@yahoo.com

     
     
   • on April 27, 2010 at 8:37 am retrieverman

     I do know some cryptozoology specialists. Would you mind if I forwarded the photos to them?

     
     
9. on April 27, 2010 at 8:42 am Sengimage

   Lets see the photos….. please.

   
   
10. on May 26, 2010 at 4:15 am ray

    sorry i took so long to send photos but i sent a few today show them i want the world to know but i wont betray there whereabouts i told many people different areas , i have the two track lines on mini dv they looked more impressive in formation some times when they land you c a v shape with claws, which no doubt thats why the dutch said claws of a tiger and the stipes as well

    
    
    • on May 26, 2010 at 6:21 am retrieverman

      Okay. I’ll post them some time this evening.

      
      
    • on May 26, 2010 at 10:06 am Sengimage

      You’d think that with so much awareness and public opinion for bringing back this species…. That if they were real…. their entire habitat would be declared a sanctuary and enforced with “shoot to kill poacher policies”. Running on a strict shoot first and ask questions later policy.

      
      
11. on May 27, 2010 at 4:20 pm ray

    did you get them photos

    
    
    • on May 27, 2010 at 4:35 pm retrieverman

      Will post.

      
      
12. on May 29, 2010 at 4:04 am ray

    because these sites r slow at puting up pics i put on flickr under (the one 34) some photo i will add from time to time but i keep the best for last.

    
    
13. on June 18, 2010 at 6:16 am Cjay

    Do you think we should clone them?
    I’m stuck between yes and no but mainly going over to no.
    Any ideas?

    
    
    • on June 18, 2010 at 7:35 am retrieverman

      It’s so expensive to clone them that the money might be more useful to spend it on something more important– like protecting quolls (native cats).

      
      
14. on January 18, 2011 at 9:59 am Leo

    This is science fiction, but I think mankind could manage to bring back most of the species we once wiped out one day in the future.

    Besides the thylacine, there were more species in Australia that went extinct, like the marsupial lion, marsupial tapir, the giant wombat, the giant carnivore bird Genyornis, the giant turtle Meiolania and last but not least the 7 meter long lizard Megalania. The list continues. All of them went extinct around the time when Homo sapiens first arrived in Australia.

    And it doesn’t stop in Australia. On most other continents a lot of large animals went extinct when Homo sapiens arrived there first. The Thylacine just sorts into a long list of creature we already wiped out during our presence in the past 50 000 years.

    If human technology progresses we could maybe start a renaturation program in the coming decades. Not to play god, but to rebuilt, what we destroyed. To make earth our garden, instead of making it a desert.

    We could restore the lost ecosystems where modern kangaroos share the habitat as they used to be before we arrived with thylacines, giant womants and giant birds . In a large network those ecosystem could be connected by “green highways” so species can migrate.
    The concept could be similar to the Serengti nowadays.
    The reserve could protect all the species that are endangered today like Tasmanian devils, quolls AND resurrected species like the thylacine sharing the same habitiat. Tourists could visit the reserves and take photographs, scientists could study the species.

    In a high technology world of the future, we might not want to continue turning our planet into a desert, instead we could restore our heritage: the Pleistocene megafauna living togher in large reserves in harmony with all the species that survived human civilisation up to now.

    
    
    • on January 18, 2011 at 10:04 am retrieverman

      http://www.gearlog.com/2011/01/scientists_to_clone_wooly_mamm.php

      
      
15. on May 8, 2011 at 3:50 pm Richard Freeman

    Cloning is a waste of time even if it could be done. Thylacines are not extinct. The futire of this animal lies in the forests of Tasmania, the outback of Australia and the monutains of Iyrian Jaya.

    
    
16. on August 8, 2011 at 2:17 pm ThoughtProcess

    To everyone saying “cloning is a waste” instead of saving animals which are not extinct, you don’t understand the motivation. This is not about conservation by any stretch. It’s simply about scientific achievement. Setting aside land to protect a species doesn’t get you in the papers like cloning one of these high-profile animals would. In fact, science has already briefly brought an animal back from extinction yet few people even know it (Pyrenean Ibex in 2009). “Creating” a living Thylacine would make international news for sure. That’s the real appeal of this project. Scientific achievement and recognition and nothing more.

    
    

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