In May 2017 I created a slideshow presentation about the Tasmanian Tiger. I chose to do a research project about this animal because I am very interested in marsupials and animals who have gone extinct. Unlike many other mammals they give birth to very small young who grow inside of a pouch on the mother’s underside. The Tasmanian tiger is a supposedly extinct animal which has an incredibly sad story. I have attached The slides accompanied with the research that I performed below.
Slides
links in this slide: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5f1_Vv1wri8 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1way8xEsxUg
links in this post: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6vqCCI1ZF7o
links in this slide: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D_M-SskpGi4
Research
WHAT IS IT
Thylacine is proper name
Scientific name: Thylacinus cynocephalus
Means dog-headed pouched one in greek
Was largest carnivorous marsupial until 1986
Aka opossum hyena
Last member of the thylacinidae family (dog-like carnivorous marsupials)
HABITAT
Continental Australia’s eucalypts forests, wetlands grasslands
Also found in new guinea thousands of years ago
We know this because we found fossils and aboriginal paintings
Thylacines disappeared from New Guinea and Australia because of competition for food by the dodo bird and dingo
In tasmania they preferred woodlands of the mid tasmanian and coastal heath which became prime housing and livestock territory
Home range of 15-30 sq mi
Non territorial
APPEARANCE
13-20 stripes on its back that resemble tiger
Stripes fade as they age
Light to dark brown fur
Belly is cream
Short, soft haired
Hair felt wooly
Very long tails 25 tail vertebrae that’d be 3 ½ of our necks
Tail doesn’t bend
6ft from nose to tail tip
2 ft tall at the shoulder
66lbs
Size of mickey
Europeans thought they were hyenas
Jaws open up to 80 degrees
Muscular but weak jaws with 64 teeth
Front feet had five digits while back feet had four digits
Non retractable claws
Tri-lobal feet but dogs have two lobes
5-7 yrs in wild
9 yrs in captivity
BEHAVIOUR
Nocturnal creatures
Shy and secretive
Avoided contact with humans
Spend the day in small caves, tree hollows, nests
Retreated to sheltered forest in day and hunted in the open heath at night
Able to balance on its hind feet
Can hop like a kangaroo
Usually very quiet creatures
Growl and hiss when agitated Gives off bad odour when agitated
Made cough-like barks when hunting
Whining cry for location
Low noises for communication between family members
An awkward gait – almost a trot
Persistent runner, but not extremely fast
Very well tempered
Did not resist capture which lead to their extinction
Many died from shock while encaptured
HUNTING/DIET
Ate meat
Crepuscular hunters
Relied on sight and sound for hunting- not a good sense of smell
Very smart hunter
Relied on prey to exhaust
Preyed upon sheep and poultry from settlers
Rarely a scavenger
Mostly wallabies
BREEDING
Winter and spring were breeding season
Joeys are born hairless
Crawled into the mother’s pouch
Four joeys could be carried at one time
Litter size was usually only three
As the joeys grow the pouch expands until it almost reaches the ground
When joeys are ready to leave the pouch they have fur and stripes and remain in a very secure den
WHY ARE THEY EXTINCT
Hunting and habitat were main cause
distemper -disease killed off a few in the later years
Settlers introduced thylacine bounty because they ate their livestock
Price for killing a thylacine was only 1 pound = 1.30 usd
By 1909 2184 thylacines were killed for bounty
They were sought after by zoos around the world
1926 london zoo bought their last thylacine for 150 pounds= 194 usd
That would be around $2,874 now or 2219 pounds now
1933 last thylacine captured for hobart zoo
1936 last thylacine ever seen again died
1936 thylacine added to protected wildlife just 59 days before benjamin died
1986 thylacine pronounced extinct
John gould was an english ornithologist ( an expert on birds) and bird artist
ARE THEY STILL AROUND
Sightings have occurred, but no conclusive evidence
People think they see them mostly at night in the northern area of tasmania
Much research has been put into cloning dna
Thylacine is on the list of many extinct animals to become “de extinct”
Research started in 1999 but was halted in 2005 because the dna was in poor condition
Scientist from university of melbourne have spliced tasmanian tiger dna into a tasmanian devil
Maybe 20 years before we get an actual tasmanian tiger
Many questions to be asked
Will the animal made in a test tube be able to learn how to be a tiger?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cax8FzIXVp4 – sighting?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1way8xEsxUg – how they would run
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6vqCCI1ZF7o – last known thylacine alive
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5f1_Vv1wri8 -bark
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D_M-SskpGi4 2008 sighting