In your opinion, is there any chance the Thylacine still exists?

Question

There are still sightings, but nothing confirmed. Any one Down Under care to answer?

Answer 1

Well, the last known live specimen died in the Hobarth zoo in 1936, but that's not to say that it might not still exist in limited numbers somewhere in the deep bush. There have been several instances in recent history where a species long thought to be extinct suddenly makes an appearance, such as the ivory-billed woodpecker in the American Northeast, and the coelecanth, caught in such places as the Pacific Northwest and off the coast of South America. So to answer your question, yes, there is a chance the thylacine Tasmanian tiger still exists.

Answer 2

I really hope that they still exist, but in my heart of hearts i doubt that they do.
There have been many "good" sightings over the years, but not a single scrap of hard evidence- no droppings with Thylacine DNA, no confirmed footprints, no photos- and importantly, given the area that Thylacines would have to cover in order to secure enough food, no road kill. I have worked for many years as a wildlife surveyor and as a ranger in Tasmania. I met many people who swore blind that they had seen Thylacines, but interestingly enough the most convincing sightings of Thylacines were from mainland Australia, where they used to occur. I have had people convince me that they had seen them, but my being convinced that others had seen them is not going to stand up to scientific scrutiny. If Thylacines are out there, they are in trouble. Massive 1080 baiting programs by forestry operators in Tasmania are likely to make the animals vulnerable, on top of inbreeding and increasing traffic. The recent introduction of the red fox to Tasmania could be the last straw, if thylacines are still there. If Thylacines are on the mainland, competition with foxes, habitat destruction and the introduction of the toxic cane toad all spell disaster. There is a chance that the facial tumour disease devastating the Tasmanian Devil population could also wipe out the thylacine, or perhaps, just perhaps, give them the opportunity to breed up.

None of this changes the fact that western culture was responsible for the demise of the Thylacine in Tasmania (the introduction of the Dingo several thousand years ago is almost certainly responsible for the death of the Thylacine on the mainland). Maybe we want it to be still out there to absolve us of some of the responsibility for wiping it out, as the extinction of the world's largest carnivorous marsupial in such a short period of time is not something to have on our collective conscience. However, through our reckless consumption, our addiction to airconditioning, automobiles and a fossil fuel driven civilization, we are dooming animals every bit as special and as interesting to the Thylacine every day. If you think losing pages from the book of life is something we ought to be worried about, take responsibility, get politically active, find out where the things you buy come from and how much they really cost (not just you, but the Earth). The Thylacine is a good symbol of the fragility of this planet. If we do not care about it, we will lose it.

Answer 3

I hope they still exist...I think there could still be a few..look what happened with the Ivory Billed Woodpecker..who know's maybe they will be re-discovered too. Check out the book "Carnivorous Nights", they investigate many of the sightings which usually turn up to be a completely different animal that people call in. Also tells about scientists that are trying to clone the tasmania tiger right now.

Answer 4

Thylacines, aka: Tasmanian Tiger or Tasmanian Wolf, are assumed to be extinct. They were very shy creatures to begin with, so the possibiliy of a few remaining is possible. Even if they do still exist, the population is likely to be to small for a viable genetic base and the remaining undeveloped territory is to small to support very many. They may yet be done in by inbreeding.

Answer 5

Which god? Jehovah, or any of the three abrahamic gods, or any god, or what? it is totally not basic to assert what the probability is because all of us understand so little. i'd say the probabilities of any god present are per chance as extreme as one in one hundred, even as the probabilities of any of the abrahamic gods present is better like one in a quadrillion, or a lot less. >i'm 0.5-tempted, you be conscious, to declare that any individual who considers there to be even the slightest probability to be a believer. That doesn't be precise. An atheist is someone who believes that the probabilities of God present are lower than 50%. I propose, evaluate. imagine you took one thousand dice and placed them in an opaque cardboard field and shook the field round. and picture that then, before you opened the field, I requested you no matter if you believed that each and each and every unmarried die contained in the field became oriented with the six on the accurate. you would likely say no, top? And yet it is nevertheless plausible, in reality in case you anticipate that each and each and every die has a nil.17 probability of showing six (it is truly larger than one in six, because drilling out the holes variations the middle of gravity of the die), then you definately can compute the probabilities of each and every of the dice showing sixes to be 0.17^one thousand or about 2.80 one*10^-770 (it truly is 0.0000... continuing for 769 zeroes after the decimal element before attaining the digits 281... and so on). As a good better celebration, imagine if I purely requested you no matter if you believed there became a enormous pink baboon orbiting the favorite individual Antares. back, you would likely say no, and yet technically there remains a small probability that one of those baboon exists. As such, the version between 0 probability and nonzero probability does no longer strike me as an effective criterion for determining no matter if someone believes in some thing.

Answer 6

Well, it is not the first time that humans would have erased a wild animal from the face of the earth, But I do beleive there is always an outside chance that they can still be around. Tazmania is a large place, and Im sure that researchers havent checked every nook and cranny.........So I remain hopeful.....it would definatly be cool if they were still alive..........

Answer 7

No, I wish they were. Maybe they can re-introduce the species through cloning some far off day. They would be a good candidate that wouldn't upset the current ecological balance and would be very popular in Zoos.

Answer 8

Yes the "Tasmanian tiger" as it's also called may be supposedly extinct, but sightings continue to this day and farmers hear their howles and even tracks are occasionally found.

Answer 9

Never seen one before, they might still do you never know.