Wednesday 4 May 2011

new theory on Tasmanian Tigers

Dingoes Didn't Run Tasmanian Tigers Out of Australia
by Jennifer Welsh, LiveScience Staff Writer
Date: 03 May 2011
The extinct thylacine, more commonly known as the "Tasmanian tiger" or "marsupial wolf," hunted more like a cat than a dog meaning the tiger moniker may be the more appropriate nickname.            
The thylacine had the striped coat of a tiger, the body of a dog and like other marsupials (including kangaroos and opossums) carried its young in a pouch. These carnivores were last seen in Australia 3,000 years ago, having died out after the introduction of the dingoes by humans. The last remaining populations were sheltered by their isolation on the island of Tasmania, surviving until the 1900s, when a concentrated eradication effort wiped the thylacine out.Researchers hypothesized that the dingoes were a main cause of the thylacine decline  in Australia, because the two species were in direct competition -- using the same hunting strategies to hunt the same prey.

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