WEBVTT - Is the Tasmanian Tiger Really Extinct? 0:00:01.920 --> 0:00:07.040 Welcome to Brainstuff, a production of iHeart Radio. Hey brain Stuff, 0:00:07.080 --> 0:00:11.039 Lauren vogelbam here. You've no doubt heard of the Tasmanian 0:00:11.080 --> 0:00:14.600 Devil or seen an animated version the Whirling Dervish and 0:00:14.680 --> 0:00:18.960 Looney Tunes cartoons. But what about the Tasmanian tiger. It's 0:00:19.000 --> 0:00:21.840 actually not even a tiger at all, instead a marsupial 0:00:21.960 --> 0:00:24.239 known as the Thila scene and it's thought to have 0:00:24.280 --> 0:00:27.920 gone extinct almost a hundred years ago. But did it really? 0:00:28.480 --> 0:00:31.840 While many experts believed the last known Thilacene died at 0:00:31.880 --> 0:00:35.879 Australia's Hobart Zoos in ninety six, others ardently claimed that 0:00:35.880 --> 0:00:39.000 the animal still exists because they've spotted one or more 0:00:39.040 --> 0:00:43.320 in the wild. We spoke by email with Katherine Medlock, 0:00:43.479 --> 0:00:46.880 Honorary Curator of Vertebrate Zoology at the Tasmanian Museum and 0:00:47.000 --> 0:00:51.639 Art Gallery. She said the international, Australian and State definition 0:00:51.640 --> 0:00:54.160 of an extinct species is that there has been no 0:00:54.280 --> 0:00:58.560 reliable evidence of the species for fifty years. By this definition, 0:00:58.800 --> 0:01:03.600 they are officially an extinct species. Although designated as officially extinct, 0:01:03.880 --> 0:01:06.920 it's difficult to prove that something is not there, as 0:01:06.920 --> 0:01:09.800 opposed to proving it is. There are many cases of 0:01:09.800 --> 0:01:15.720 species being rediscovered many years after supposed extinction. We also 0:01:15.760 --> 0:01:18.840 spoke via email with Rick Schwartz, an animal ambassador for 0:01:18.920 --> 0:01:22.880 California San Diego Zoo. He explained that quote. Since the 0:01:22.920 --> 0:01:25.720 nineteen thirties, there have been a few claims that Tasmanian 0:01:25.720 --> 0:01:29.160 tigers have been seen for brief moments in the wild. However, 0:01:29.480 --> 0:01:32.800 no substantial evidence has proven they exist at this time. 0:01:34.319 --> 0:01:36.840 We also spoke via email with Neil Waters of the 0:01:36.840 --> 0:01:41.480 Thi Lacene Awareness Group of Australia, who sort of disagrees quote, 0:01:41.800 --> 0:01:44.480 do I think the animal is extinct? No, because I 0:01:44.480 --> 0:01:48.000 have seen too and been coughed slash embarked at by one. 0:01:48.040 --> 0:01:51.840 In South Australia, there have been more than seven thousand 0:01:51.880 --> 0:01:54.800 documented sightings of Thi lacens or animals that appear to 0:01:54.800 --> 0:01:58.960 be thilocenes, but the majority of those sightings on mainland Australia. 0:01:59.120 --> 0:02:01.680 According to the signed Vick formula applied to mammals, though 0:02:01.920 --> 0:02:05.360 it is extinct and has been since ninety six, for 0:02:05.440 --> 0:02:08.760 fifty years the animal was considered rare and endangered. This 0:02:08.880 --> 0:02:12.799 fact inconveniently keeps the animal as a recent extinction rather 0:02:12.840 --> 0:02:15.280 than an ancient one. We should lose hope over and 0:02:15.320 --> 0:02:20.080 forget about. Let's step back a bit. What exactly is 0:02:20.120 --> 0:02:23.720 a Tasmanian tiger. Schwartz explained that it's not a big 0:02:23.760 --> 0:02:27.240 cat at all. He said the name tiger most likely 0:02:27.320 --> 0:02:29.720 was given to the animal by the European settlers due 0:02:29.800 --> 0:02:32.240 to the light stripes that went from the spine down 0:02:32.280 --> 0:02:35.080 each side on the hind end of the animal. Most 0:02:35.120 --> 0:02:38.360 people agree that the Tasmanian tiger looks like a medium sized, 0:02:38.360 --> 0:02:41.360 short haired dog, with subtle stripes on its hind quarters 0:02:41.400 --> 0:02:44.200 and the base of its tail. The tail was thick 0:02:44.240 --> 0:02:46.920 and muscular at the base, more like a kangaroo's tail 0:02:46.919 --> 0:02:49.799 than a dog's tail. The colorations were described as a 0:02:49.880 --> 0:02:54.480 light brown and yellow brown with darker brown stripes. These 0:02:54.480 --> 0:02:57.160 animals weighed about forty five to seventy pounds that's twenty 0:02:57.200 --> 0:03:00.160 to thirty kilos, with a body length of fort is 0:03:00.320 --> 0:03:03.720 or a hundred to cis with that tail adding another 0:03:03.760 --> 0:03:07.840 twenty or fifty to sixty centimes. Most stood about two 0:03:07.840 --> 0:03:10.359 feet tall or two thirds of a meter at the shoulder. 0:03:11.520 --> 0:03:14.560 Short said, in our modern times, we usually think of 0:03:14.600 --> 0:03:19.440 marsupials as koalas and kangaroos. However, the Tasmanian tiger had 0:03:19.480 --> 0:03:23.120 a number of unique characteristics. Being a dog like medium 0:03:23.160 --> 0:03:27.639 sized carnivore that's also a marsupial, its size and features 0:03:27.639 --> 0:03:30.040 were more similar to that of a small wolf or 0:03:30.200 --> 0:03:33.600 large fox. Combine that with the striped pattern on the 0:03:33.680 --> 0:03:36.920 hind end and a thick muscular tail similar to a kangaroo, 0:03:37.280 --> 0:03:40.840 and you've got a pretty unique animal. And Waters said, 0:03:41.200 --> 0:03:43.080 when you have a close look at the prince, we 0:03:43.160 --> 0:03:45.240 find you will see time and time again at the 0:03:45.280 --> 0:03:48.960 broad splay of the toes and the claw drag impressions 0:03:49.000 --> 0:03:51.880 from the massive fixed claws on the animals four feet. 0:03:52.520 --> 0:03:54.720 The reason they are sprayed wide and not like a 0:03:54.800 --> 0:03:58.920 dog is because th lacenes don't have webbing between their toes. 0:03:59.480 --> 0:04:02.520 Their front feet also still act similar to hands, as 0:04:02.560 --> 0:04:05.440 they can both hop like a kangaroo or run on 0:04:05.480 --> 0:04:08.400 all fours. As a result, many of the princes appear 0:04:08.480 --> 0:04:10.920 that the front feet are literally grabbing the ground as 0:04:10.960 --> 0:04:13.480 they dig in on curves or at high speed when 0:04:13.480 --> 0:04:19.560 pursuing prey. When Europeans first colonized Australia, the Tasmanian tiger 0:04:19.680 --> 0:04:23.240 was rarely seen. The animals started to become increasingly blamed 0:04:23.240 --> 0:04:26.160 for at tax on sheep. However, so private companies and 0:04:26.279 --> 0:04:29.840 the Tasmanian government attempted to curb the population by establishing 0:04:29.880 --> 0:04:33.720 bounties in exchange for dead Thi lacenes. Adding to their 0:04:33.720 --> 0:04:37.839 eventual extinction was the sad fact that Australia's colonization eroded 0:04:37.920 --> 0:04:42.359 the Thi lacens habitat. By the nineteen twenties, sightings of 0:04:42.360 --> 0:04:45.719 the Tasmanian tiger in the wild became extremely rare, and 0:04:45.920 --> 0:04:49.040 in nineteen thirty a farmer shot and killed the second 0:04:49.120 --> 0:04:53.679 to last known wild Tasmanian tiger. The final Thi lacene 0:04:53.800 --> 0:04:56.960 was captured in the Florentine Valley in ninety three and 0:04:57.040 --> 0:05:01.080 transferred to the Hobart Zoo on September se In six, 0:05:01.160 --> 0:05:05.200 the animal, known as Benjamin, died in captivity. Black and 0:05:05.200 --> 0:05:08.080 white footage recorded in nineteen thirty three would become historically 0:05:08.120 --> 0:05:12.800 significant as images of the final thiala scene. In seven, 0:05:12.800 --> 0:05:15.960 the Tasmanian Animals and Birds Protection Board a later to 0:05:16.000 --> 0:05:19.400 become the National Park Service, launched a series to determine 0:05:19.440 --> 0:05:24.880 where thialacenes still might be found, Medlock said, Unfortunately, a 0:05:24.960 --> 0:05:27.720 living animal was not discovered. The final search in this 0:05:27.839 --> 0:05:31.440 series was into the Jaine River area in western Tasmania. 0:05:31.600 --> 0:05:34.200 On this search, some Thi lacene footprints were discovered in 0:05:34.240 --> 0:05:37.400 creek bed. The original plaster casts of these prints are 0:05:37.400 --> 0:05:41.240 lodged in the Tasmanian Museum. The Tasmanian Museum doesn't receive 0:05:41.279 --> 0:05:44.400 sighting reports and we don't have the expertise to assess them. 0:05:44.520 --> 0:05:47.200 This is done by the Department of Primary Industries, Water 0:05:47.279 --> 0:05:51.479 and Environment. They continue to record reported sightings and take 0:05:51.520 --> 0:05:55.880 them seriously. Often, however, sightings, films and photographs are released 0:05:55.880 --> 0:05:58.240 to the media through the people who are reporting them 0:05:58.440 --> 0:06:01.320 rather than a government body. Over the years, there have 0:06:01.400 --> 0:06:04.479 been several instances of photographs and films purported to be 0:06:04.560 --> 0:06:07.400 Thi lacens in the wild, but none have been verified 0:06:07.440 --> 0:06:12.039 as genuine evidence of an animal. Waters however, contends that 0:06:12.040 --> 0:06:15.560 there have been dozens of credible sightings of dilocenes. He said, 0:06:15.960 --> 0:06:19.080 actually hundreds of them too many A name. One in 0:06:19.120 --> 0:06:22.000 particular was a bus load of tourists in Western Australia 0:06:22.000 --> 0:06:24.360 back in the nineteen eighties who all saw the animal 0:06:24.400 --> 0:06:27.520 at close range in broad daylight whilst on a wildflower tour. 0:06:28.360 --> 0:06:31.479 The fact that we find headless kangaroos all over Australia 0:06:31.600 --> 0:06:33.919 is a key piece of physical evidence that these animals 0:06:33.960 --> 0:06:36.640 still persist, but nobody wants to know about it because 0:06:36.640 --> 0:06:39.960 it's always blamed on either hunters or satanists by ill 0:06:40.000 --> 0:06:45.000 informed people who don't understand how these animals feed. Waters 0:06:45.040 --> 0:06:47.640 has been working tirelessly to raise public awareness of this 0:06:47.720 --> 0:06:51.240 animal's continued existence for the past five years, meeting dozens 0:06:51.240 --> 0:06:54.200 of witnesses and collecting thousands of statements regarding sightings of 0:06:54.240 --> 0:06:58.240 this animal in both Tasmania and across mainland Australia. His 0:06:58.279 --> 0:07:01.240 work appears in the twenty seventeen document entry Living the 0:07:01.320 --> 0:07:05.320 Thigh Lacene Dream, which follows Waters travels throughout mainland Australia 0:07:05.400 --> 0:07:08.120 to collect evidence of predation, as well as stories of 0:07:08.160 --> 0:07:10.520 sightings from witnesses who are adamant they've seen the thi 0:07:10.640 --> 0:07:19.400 la scene both recently and historically. Today's episode was written 0:07:19.440 --> 0:07:22.040 by Wendy Bowman and produced by Tyler Clang. For more 0:07:22.040 --> 0:07:24.040 on this and lots of other curious topics, visit how 0:07:24.040 --> 0:07:27.119 stuff works dot com. Brain Stuff is production of iHeart Radio. 0:07:27.400 --> 0:07:29.520 For more podcasts for my heart Radio, visit the iHeart 0:07:29.560 --> 0:07:32.160 Radio app, Apple podcasts, or wherever you listen to your 0:07:32.160 --> 0:07:32.840 favorite shows.