Thylacine (1 Viewer)

chowchilla said:

There wouldn't be a deliberate legal introduction, but I've met some breathtakingly stupid people here who see no issue with the introduction of foxes to Tassie, including one Tasmanian I used to work with: "Some people like to shoot them for sport and why shouldn't Tasmanians also have that opportunity?", or something like that...

Yes, it's a dumb, crass argument, but it's a hunters' argument. Nuff said...

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As we know from these islands, there is never any logic in hunters' arguments.

We had a similar experience in the Isle of Man, from where foxes are absent, as are a number of other species of mammals that live across the water in Britain. Round about 1990 it was realised that some half wit had released some foxes in the Island, for hunting, it was claimed. At least 2 foxes were killed on roads near Peel, another was actually shot by a public spirited fellow and a family of young was found and sent to the UK, the presumed source of the releases. Reports of foxes have dwindled since those days, although an old lady, who lived in a nursing home just up the road from where I live, reported a fox on the lawn of the home about two years ago. It was reported at the time that she was familiar with foxes from when she lived in the UK, so it must have been a fox that she was seeing. However, wouldn't foxes "thin out" the local domestic cat population, something that hasn't happened?

I remember just after the fox releases on the Isle of Man that reports of releases on Tasmania were on the BBC news. "Not there as well," I remember thinking.

Allen

chowchilla said:

There wouldn't be a deliberate legal introduction, but I've met some breathtakingly stupid people here who see no issue with the introduction of foxes to Tassie, including one Tasmanian I used to work with: "Some people like to shoot them for sport and why shouldn't Tasmanians also have that opportunity?", or something like that...

Yes, it's a dumb, crass argument, but it's a hunters' argument. Nuff said...

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there's also the issue of the anti-conservation lot. In NZ there have been cases where people protesting against 1080 poisoning and against the proposal to wipe deer and pigs from Stewart Island have threatened to (and in some cases I believe, have carried out) release mustelids on Stewart Island and possums onto Kapiti Island. There are always stupid people everywhere.

I've always found that a great site for thylacine information to be the thylacine museum site http://www.naturalworlds.org/thylacine/ it has all 7 of the known thylacine film recordings, which are really fascinating, but also hautingly sad at the same time. Still, I love watching them. Of all the extinct animals, I think the thylacine is the most fascinating to me and I really wish that I could have seen one.

chowchilla said:

I've met some breathtakingly stupid people here who see no issue with the introduction of foxes to Tassie, including one Tasmanian I used to work with: "Some people like to shoot them for sport and why shouldn't Tasmanians also have that opportunity?", or something like that...

Yes, it's a dumb, crass argument, but it's a hunters' argument. Nuff said...

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I can't argue with your last statement. Perhaps people like your old work colleague should turn their attention to feral cats and pigs (actually, if I remember correctly, pig hunting is a popular hobby in rural Australia).

Fingers crossed Red Foxes don't get established on Tasmania or it won't just be the Thylacine going extinct.

for me the last decent sighting was 1963 investigated by Eric Guiller, he said he found footprints and he's one of the few I would Believe, post 1936 they were still arround due to the work of the legend that was Trooper Flemming and others in the late 30s. I'm sure into the 40s as there are authentic sounding reports of animals killed by trappers and in the late 50's again Eric Guiller found footprints hair and scat although getting dna fom these is prooving extreemly difficult. The last decent sounding sighting was in late 1972. in the early 70's Dr Guiller set up traps with premission of the governemt but found nothing and in the early 80's set up many automatic cameras and again got nothing.
The Hans Nardings 1982 sighting cannot be ignored because he was a parks ranger but he was asleep seconds before so it's possible he was not fully awake and he was unable to get a picture and rain destroyed any footprint evidence.
there are many sightings in S.Australia in Victoria and NSW but they don't have enough good habitat and there are too many many rivals dingos, wild dogs foxes and too much farm land. Wilsons Promontory where roumours persist that Mary Grant-Roberts released Thylacines from Baumaris zoo in the early
1900s is just too small and surounded by farm land.
the problem is that the S.Australia sightings can't be true and they sound as authentic as the ones on Tasmania. Now there are so few people who remember tigers from a time when we know for sure that they existed that any sighting cannot be compared to the real thing.
the tiger has become a cryptozoological animal in the realm of the yeti or nessie.
The drop in population that occured in 1904-6 meant that bounty or animals sold to zoos went from about 100 a year to 4 or 5 trailing off to nothing in 1909, the last was shot in 1930 and that was an animal out and about in daylight trying to get into a chicken coop nest to a house. This is odd behavour for a shy nocturnal animal with a fear of humans and points to a population under severe stress. such a massive drop in population by about 80% in 1905 was probably due to a strain of pnumonia. An animal with such a slow rate of reproduction suffering contious hunting and loss of habitat would never be able to recover.
A sighting of a female with pups in 1932 gives hope but since there were never more than 3000 or so in Tasmania means that after the 1905 crash, there would only have been a few hundred left probaly no more than 200.

I think they probably hung on into the 50's and possibly the 60's but no longer I think they're all gone, but I would so love to be wrong

Thanks Billib, extremely interesting.
Unfortunatly I think you are correct in them being lost forever.
But we can always hope.

Steve

Thylacine is funny story... officially extinct, but Australian government twice made a lenghty search after experienced rangers saw one...

The marvel of foresnic DNA analysis brought a new chance for it. Any scat or hair can now be objectively examined. And common use of digital cameras means that any footprints are likely to be documented.

I wonder if there is any material preserved from some of post-1930s records, which can be re-examined using DNA analysis?

jurek said:

Thylacine is funny story... officially extinct, but Australian government twice made a lenghty search after experienced rangers saw one...

The marvel of foresnic DNA analysis brought a new chance for it. Any scat or hair can now be objectively examined. And common use of digital cameras means that any footprints are likely to be documented.

I wonder if there is any material preserved from some of post-1930s records, which can be re-examined using DNA analysis?

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there is post 1930s dna but it is too deteriorated or contaminated to be of any use as of yet this is stuffed specimines and skeletons, the best hope was a baby female tiger from 1864 preserved in alchohol but it seems the dna is too degraded to be of use, this was the one in the news 3 years ago as a possible clone. future techniques will be developed but nothing yet
it is possible that some usable samples will be found similar to the quagga specimine at Amsterdam zoo.

I think you are mistaken. Thylacine DNA was too damaged for cloning the whole animal. However, much more damaged DNA is still suitable to determine that hair, blood, dung etc. come from Thylacine rather than another animal.

you are correct, for typing and matching it is adequate. problems do occur however with ralated species such as the Tasmanian Devil and some false matches have occured due to this. devil hair and blood has been regarded as possible thylacine. A number of hoaxers in the 80's used this similarity to their advantage.
to answer the question as to wheather there is any post 1930's samples to dna test, yes there are but are probably all hoaxes, there is a possible question mark over the mummified tiger found in Thylacine Hole Cave in
W Australia in 1966 coincidently just after a possible sighting in the area.
Carbon 14 testing dated in to be about 4500 years old at the nearest but it is in very good shape and there is a possibility of cross contamination but the date can be considered accurate there have been a number of tests and they all give a date of between 4600-4700.

if it's dry enough, I don't see there being any problem with a well preserved mummy that old, and it wouldn't be unprecedented.

Think of police shows, where DNA is extracted from hair, bits of saliva etc etc.

There are several reports of Thylacine, which supposedly left behind only its lair, hair, scats etc etc. These stories can be verified. Of course, most likely is that DNA analysis identifies some other animal as the culprit.

The same can be done for other, less famous, possibly extinct animals, like some of Australian small mammals.

I saw a rather emaciated and faded Thylacine at the Senckenberg Museum in Frankfurt last week. I can't remember seeing one before.
Other interesting extinct animals included Quagga, Passenger Pigeon, Carolina Parakeet and a pair of Huias. While Naturalis stores these in a special darkened "treasure trove", they are mixed freely with extant species in Frankfurt, which I found decidedly odd.

Another animal that may be of interest to you all is the Falkland Island Fox. It has a similar story to the thylacine and was eliminated for the same reasons. One was even exhibited at london zoo in 1868 to about 1871. I have been unable to find any photos but they must exist, perhaps someone here knows?

Mysticete said:

if it's dry enough, I don't see there being any problem with a well preserved mummy that old, and it wouldn't be unprecedented.

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very true I think it's more a case of a reluctance to let them go and a refusal to accept that we humans wiped them all out.
If cloning in the future can produce a large enough genetic group then they do have a chance, but even unfortunately now there are people who would still shoot it on sight, either as a pest or for money.

Billib said:

Another animal that may be of interest to you all is the Falkland Island Fox..................I have been unable to find any photos but they must exist, perhaps someone here knows?

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Billib - this may be of interest/use
http://scienceblogs.com/tetrapodzoology/2007/12/island_endemic_otters_canids.php

good site, thanks for the link
I suppose I could also include the Honshu/Japanes Wolf, another dog like animal wiped out, again for the same reasons

At least some dog breeds have a fair bit of Japanese Wolf in them...wonder if you could reconsitute the species like people have been trying to do with Tarpan or Auroch

Mysticete said:

At least some dog breeds have a fair bit of Japanese Wolf in them...wonder if you could reconsitute the species like people have been trying to do with Tarpan or Auroch

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I don't see why not, as well as the ones you mention there is also the Guagga back breeding program in SA
so I don't see why you couldn't get something that was at least 80% japanese wolf.
The last british wolf was killed in 1743 but that may have been a cross with a dog, so as with the japanese wolf it would be difficult to say when the last pure wolf died. there are only about 10 specimens of the Honshu in the world so defining exactly what dna designated a pure breed may be difficult.

It also now looks as if the Devil will be extinct by 2050, if we can't save them, there's no point in cloning a tiger.