A new Australian study has shed significant light on the hunting prowess of the extinct thylacine, commonly known as the Tasmanian tiger, revealing its unique predatory style was incomparable to any animal alive today. The research, led by Flinders University and the University of Melbourne, challenges historical perceptions that contributed to the marsupial’s demise, ABC News reported yesterday.
Published in Nature Communications, the study found that the thylacine’s distinctive skull features suggest its jaws were poorly suited for subduing large animals like sheep. Instead, its long, deep jaw was adapted for delivering powerful, fast snapping bites to capture smaller, agile prey, according to the ABC. This finding directly contradicts the long-standing myth that the thylacine was a significant threat to livestock, a belief that fuelled bounty schemes and ultimately led to its extinction.
Professor Vera Weisbecker from Flinders University, who led the study, stated that their findings on the thylacine’s feeding adaptations “counter the myths that drove the thylacine to extinction,” as reported by AAP News. For generations, the thylacine (Thylacinus cynocephalus) was often compared to Northern Hemisphere predators such as wolves and foxes, even earning its species name ‘cynocephalus’, meaning ‘dog-head’, due to its superficial resemblance.
However, the research highlights that thylacines were marsupials, more closely related to kangaroos than to dogs, with their ancestors diverging from other mammals long before the dinosaurs disappeared, ABC News detailed. Co-author Dr. Douglass Rovinsky noted that while an average thylacine weighed only half as much as an average wolf, its oversized skull was roughly the same size. Yet, its snout was long and slender, almost delicate, unlike the robust snouts of large canids, more akin to a fox or jackal, AAP News reported.
The research team conducted detailed 3D shape analyses of thylacine skulls alongside 60 species of carnivorous mammals, including big cats and extinct marsupial predators. They discovered that the thylacine’s skull possessed a unique combination of features – an oversized skull, a long and tall upper jaw, and a mace-like widened snout – that does not match any known adaptations of living carnivorous mammals. This “big head, lethal snap” adaptation, while unusual in mammals, is seen in other animals like crocodiles and predatory fish that use fast-snapping jaws for agile prey, according to Professor Weisbecker via AAP News.
The last known thylacine died in Hobart’s Beaumaris Zoo in 1936, marking the end of a lineage that stretched back over 30 million years. Professor Weisbecker emphasised that the thylacine’s extinction is “a story of ignorance and lack of respect for Australia’s unique wildlife and its Indigenous custodians,” as reported by Discover Magazine. The study also acknowledged that many museum specimens used in the research were collected without the consent or involvement of Indigenous communities, suggesting future work should involve Palawa and other communities connected to the animal.
This new understanding of the thylacine’s true nature serves as a poignant reminder of the importance of safeguarding Tasmania’s irreplaceable surviving species. Readers interested in the full details of this study can find more information via the original ABC News report.