On this day in 1936....

[jjjnettie]

On this day in 1936, the very last Thylacine died. :(
What a testament to our pig ignorance as a race, that we should have hunted such a unique and beautiful creature to extinction. :(

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=odswge5onwY&feature=share

thanks to Veronica Sullivan for the reminder.

[Stardrifter_WA]

That is sad jjjnettie, but sadly, not unusual, as we still haven't learned that lesson, it seems? :sadeyes:

[Zhou]

The madness continues

http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2012/sep/07/yangtze-finless-porpoise-china

[GeoffW1]

Hi,

Wouldn't it be fantastic if they survive yet! However I fear that's the same as seeing aliens land.

It was in this mood I recently read Julia Leigh's "The Hunter" (also a good film starring Willem Dafoe), a novel about a man sent to hunt a (possibly the last) wild thylacine. It is set in just-recent times, and the theme seems to be on the intrusion of the outside, technical, commercial world into the preserved stillness of the remote Tasmanian wilderness.

I found it saddening and plausible, just as we should today.

Thanks

[Ric]

And we still haven't learnt.

[bartman]

Thank you JJJ and Veronica....


+1

Watched the movie........Believable, haunting......Well worth the watch espescially on bluray!!!!!!! get it and watch it!!!!!!

+1

Thats all:thumbsup:

[Terry B]

And according to a SMH article I read this week over 500 rhino were poached in SAfrica last year up from only~15 a few years ago so Vietnamese men can show off their wealth.

[Baddad]

A brief history of the demise of our Tassie Tiger.

Fossil records show that it lived on the Australian mainland as well.
It is suspected that the when the Dingo arrived some 15,000** years ago, food competion was too strong for the Tiger. Wiping it out on the mainland.

Dingoes did not get across Bass Strait. However after Europeans arrived in Tassie a canine disease struck the Tigers. Similar to distemper. It eventually destroyed the Tiger population.



1830 Van Diemens Land Co. introduced a thylacine bounties.
1888 Tasmanian Parliament placed a price of £1 on thylacine's head.
1909 Government bounty scheme terminated. 2184 bounties paid.
1910 Thylacines rare -- sought by zoos around the world.
1926 London Zoo bought its last thylacine for £150.
1933 Last thylacine captured, Florentine Valley, sold Hobart Zoo.
1936 World's last captive thylacine died in Hobart Zoo, ( 7/9/36).
1936 Tasmanian tiger added to the list of protected Wildlife.
1986 Thylacine declared extinct by international standards.

The extinction is wholly attributed to European settlers arriving in Tassie, through culling and introduced canine diseases.


Cheers
** 15,000 years, some say 8,000 years. Depends on reference.

[bojan]

"we" did learn, but "we" did not accepted that knowledge, and I suspect "we" never will.

(I keep on writing "we" because I don't know what "we" actually means.
Certainly not "me" ;).. I do not accept collective responsibility and collective feel of guilt)

[strongmanmike]

Yes sad affair that, amazing looking animal too.

Of course that's indeed a shame but not quite as shameful a story as that behind THIS (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Trugernanner) last Tasmanian

Mike

[jjjnettie]

:( :( :mad2: