The last of a species, caught on film

As a kid, I was fascinated by the photos of the extinct quagga that were bolted to the sides of the zebra pen at the Topeka Zoo. I knew about extinction, of course. Dinosaurs were extinct. And I knew that buffalo had been shot by the 1000s a long time ago and might have become extinct, if they hadn't been protected.

But I remember the quagga being a little shocking, nonetheless. Here was an animal, that had been alive recently enough to be photographed—not just drawn, like some imaginary beastie—but which no longer existed. Not even one. Not anywhere. It probably didn't hurt that the quagga looked just different enough for little me to feel it as a loss. It wasn't quite a horse. Not quite a zebra. And I would never see one, except as a photo.

It was a weird, existential sort of feeling, which I felt again while watching this video of a thylacine, also called Tasmanian tiger or Tasmanian wolf. This animal is actually a marsupial, not directly related to wolves (or big cats). Any similarity you see is purely convergent evolution at work—different species adapting to similar environmental niches. Not surprisingly, like the wild dogs they resemble, thylacines were hunted with abandon in the 19th and 20th centuries, because of the threat they posed to domesticated herd animals. The last confirmed* wild thylacine was killed in 1930. The last captive one died six years after that. That's him, a male sometimes referred to as "Benjamin" in this video, shot in 1933.

Thanks to Waslijn for Submitterating!

*The possibility of living thylacines in the wild is a favorite topic of cryptozoologists. There have 3800 recorded sightings on since 1936. But nothing conclusive.

Maggie Koerth-Baker is the science editor at BoingBoing.net. She writes a monthly column for The New York Times Magazine and is the author of Before the Lights Go Out, a book about electricity, infrastructure, and the future of energy. You can find Maggie on Twitter and Facebook.

Maggie goes places and talks to people. Find out where she'll be speaking next.

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Sorollets

Nice! there is an australian band that claim that they are the reencarnation of the last three alive thylacines ;)

http://www.myspace.com/thethylacines

http://www.youtube.com/user/sorollets77#p/a/u/0/4YAyh-HOGrU
elk

At the risk of sounding grateful for their absence (I’m not of course) I can see how a large # of these could have a strong effect on livestock, etc, they look like they could be very lean, efficient hunters, and I can’t help but think that (to a much lesser extreme) they are to the wolf what velociraptors were to their larger counterparts.

Fascinating and sad footage.
- Greg G
  
  Hi elk
  
  There were not a large number of Thylacines and they weren’t a threat to livestock. Much worse were the roaming packs of feral dogs that dominated the landscape in the mid-to-late 1800s.
  
  The threat was mostly created out of fear of the unknown and pressure from large landholding companies such as the Van Diemen’s Land Company that ran vast tracts of land from the UK and wanted returns from their shareholders. Local managers – often with little farming experience – were told to run sheep pretty much as they were run in the UK (which local farmers know does not work!). When the inevitable losses occurred, it was easier to blame them on “wolves” than trying to explain why Tasmania is not England.
  - BB
    
    Thank you for the context.
Brainspore

The coolest thing about them was that they could open their jaws up to 120 degrees.
freshacconci

That’s both sweet and sad…
Greg G

It’s not a male and it was never called Benjamin. ALL of that was made up by a drunkard who never worked at the Hobart Zoo and just wanted attention.

It was a female and it never had a name. This was confirmed by it’s last keeper, Alison Reid.

See Robert Paddle’s “The Last Tasmanian Tiger”.

The fetus is not in Tasmania, it’s in Sydney at the Australian Museum. If you ask, they’ll tell you where it is. It’s not a secret.

Best bit about this film – the female bit the cameraman on the arse shortly after the end of this recording.
voiceinthedistance

Sadly, he looks every bit as neurotic as you would expect for the Last Of His Species. It’s almost too easy to empathize with him. Surely a meteor falling on your head or a well placed gunshot would be preferable to being the last survivor, left to be prodded and humiliated as you wait to exit the gene pool.
- erg79
  
  More than just a bit of anthropomorphizing there, no?
- BB
  
  I agree to an extent. (Although I edited grammar poorly.) S/He is stressed because s/he is caged up; which often happens to the last of a species, or ordinary zoo inhabitants.
  - Greg G
    
    Also, she was pacing because there was a strange man in her cage with a great big noisy (?) camera.
    
    But it was a pretty awful enclosure, as were most at the time.
    
    Growing up in Tasmania there sure seemed to be a lot of “sitings” in the 80s, fewer in the 90s, and hardly any in the 00s. A cynic might make a link between this and the rise of the compact camera & camera phone, though we could have been living through the final extinction then.
    
    I think remnants probably lived until the 60s but were effectively extinct during the lifetime of this specimen.
flowerchild

It’s interestig that a species is noted as being recent enough to be photographed, thus dating it to the last century more or less. Yet at the end of the piece you refer to a video being shot in 1933 which I was unaware had been invented back then. I know it’s a small thing and perhaps shows my age that I would have called it a film but I’ve always thought that video meant it wsa generated electronically. I don’t want to get into a semantic argument about video, just noticed the contrasting use of terms.
Anonymous

I’ll bet we *do* have enough DNA to do a reproduction, though – even if it involves some creativity on the part of the genetic engineers doing the design…
- LeSinge
  
  “I’ll bet we *do* have enough DNA to do a reproduction, though – even if it involves some creativity on the part of the genetic engineers doing the design…”
  
  So long as it’s not amphibian DNA…
  
  I find this video both stunning and very sad. What an amazing animal. Glad I got to see it.
BB

What an handsome, and yet cute, animal specimen. Itâ€™s sad that it is gone, but at the same time, that particular creature looks stressed, with its constant pacing. You see that in some zoos, often by bored and distressed captives.
f sharp a sharp infinity

There’s a beautiful Mountain Goats song on their most recent record about exctinct species. The first verse refers, I think, to this very footage. Here’s a not that well recorded live version I found after a lazy YouTube search: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CdR3KKXsDDI
The song is “Deuteronomy 2:10″.
Yamara

This footage was incorporated in the movie The Howling III: The Marsupials with some effect. It was the first time I saw it, and while the film was campy ’80s werewolf horror, this footage was plenty moving and always stood out in my mind.
porkchop

Fascinating animal. So familiar (dog-like?) in some ways, and so alien in others. Kind of makes me think of the alien creatures in Avatar.

Also makes me very sad.
Anonymous

The Australian Museum had a project to try & clone the tiger, however they gave up as the DNA was too degraded.

See http://www.abc.net.au/science/news/stories/s1302459.htm
Anonymous

The last Thylacine in captivity “Benjamin” was shot?
petsounds

This footage shows the movements of the Thylacine much better. Definitely moves more like a marsupial than a canine. Moves like a possum to my eyes.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WMmQexGLYFo
Robert

Last Chance to See…
Darwindr

Thanks for the Thylacine video, very cool stuff.

*sigh* I wish Maggie had been the one asked to contribute to the EDGE 2011 Question.
millie fink

I never heard or saw it referred to as Benjamin in that video.
Anonymous

Moas are pretty amazing too. Wiped out in New Zealand before anyone took any good photos though. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Moa
Anonymous

There is a diorama of Passenger Pigeons in the Philadelphia museum of natural history (that’s not the name of the place, it’s something like “The Society of something…”) I’d never seen them before. Sad. Neat place though!
Anonymous

There is one Quagga left, and he needs a mate:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N96eS7e-2kI
VagabondAstronomer

Years ago, when I was like 9, I saw what was the first ABC Afterschool Special, “Last of the Curlews”. I cried like a baby. In the intervening decades since, I could not even hazard a guess at how many species have shuffled off their mortal coil (the Eskimo Curlew is now undoubtedly extinct as well).
And now this.
Brought back some of those same, painful feelings.
Sigh…
Anonymous

so so so sad
piminnowcheez

http://www.boingboing.net/2006/09/06/get_ready_for_nation.html
Brainspore

I hope that after we finally crack the mammoth cloning thing we do these guys next. The marsupial reproductive system is bound to throw up some interesting hurdles, though- I doubt any kangaroo would be thrilled about the idea of acting as a surrogate mother.
alowishus

The story of the Tasmanian Tiger has always been heartbreaking for me. The film footage of the last one pacing miserably in its cage only makes things worse.

It’s a beautiful creature and I hope Science can bring it back one day. Or we can find a few in the Tasmanian hills.
Buckets McGaughey

They might still be out there.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rUM4B2B3SC4
Buckets McGaughey

Or indeed:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jqdFFkabyZk&NR=1
grikdog

I don’t mourn for quaggas (or not just for). I mourn for lost members of another kingdom, e.g., the American Elm. If you lived on a residential street lined with these majestic beauties, part of your heart died with them. I once saw a red squirrel jump in the canopy, miss his landing, and free fall through 80 feet of unencumbered air, landing on the asphalt with a slap that still rings in my ears. He lived, and waddled off the road, every inch of progress a study in pain.

I’m told the American Chestnut was another one like that, especially when in bloom.
ogvor

I love that because of Maggie Koerth-Baker I now frequently see references to Topeka (where I grew up) and Lawrence (where I’m going to college) on Boing Boing.

And boy did the hippo room stink at the (WORLD FAMOUS) Topeka Zoo.
- Maggie Koerth-Baker
  
  And boy did the hippo room stink at the (WORLD FAMOUS) Topeka Zoo.
  
  Ha. To this day, I think of Peka Sue and Sub Marie every time I’m forced to stand next to somebody with terrible armpit odor.
Anonymous

About the rhinos… the main reason they’re killed is for the horn, which is ground up as an aphrodisiac. I’ve heard that as soon as Viagra was approved for sale, demand for rhino horn went through the FLOOR. Kind of amuses me, that these immense creatures may have been saved by little blue pills.
sbarnes2

It’s so beautiful. Can I has DNA clones?

And even though I never knew them, the Dodos would be nice to have back. And the Moa, the Giant Sloths, Pterodactyls, Mastodons…Life was and is beautiful.
Anonymous

Extinct animals should have endangered humans more…
http://www.eversostrange.com/2011/01/13/haasts-eagle-the-man-eating-monster/
tas121790

Ive have always thought that if or when we have the compatibilities of cloning extinct species we should try to introduce as many species that died out due to causes directly related to human activity. Maybe thats just a hair brained idea but it sounds cool.
Anonymous

There’s a stuffed one at Madrid’s museum of Natural Science, in Spain. It’s labelled as “Tilacino, lobo marsupial” (Tylacine, marsupial wolf).

http://tinyurl.com/6xj3ovd
BB

Donâ€™t clone something that canâ€™t roam free, and enjoy its life through self-determination. Even if we are sad that it is gone. If it is to be caged, prodded and examined, whose life is be enriched with its return?

Not the creatureâ€™s.

Did Mary Shelley teach you nothing, philosophically?

I am not adverse to advancements that will help the world, (all of it, including plants and animals), eliminate pain and suffering, but I am against science for entertainment, to the detriment of its experiments (this animal), without clear merit and a benefit to the species.
- tas121790
  
  Well i figured my choice if words implied that, when I said “introduced” i was implying introduced into their natural habitat not some Jurassic park thing. Maybe I should have used reintroduced.
- Brainspore
  
  Donâ€™t clone something that canâ€™t roam free…
  
  I don’t see any reason it would be impossible to re-introduce the species to the wild in a manner similar to what has been done in the United States with the Grey Wolf. Australia as a nation has developed a much greater respect for ecological conservation than it had a century ago.
Anonymous

Another unique marsupial from Tasmania, the Tasmanian Devil, is currently under threat from a facial tumour disease that is ravaging the population – about 60% so far according to this site by the Department of Primary Industries in Tassie:
http://www.tassiedevil.com.au

As a Tasmanian myself this is incredibly sad.

One other factoid about the Thylacine is that the Tasmanian government still uses its image in its logo:
http://www.islandbrassacademy.com.au/images/logo%20tas-gov.jpg
Colloquially the logo is known as ‘The dead dog in the reeds’.
humanresource

There is a preserved Tassie Tiger foetus somewhere in the state; its location is probably Tasmania’s best kept secret. I’ve heard it said by professional scientists said that we don’t have enough genetic material to clone a healthy specimen, but then again, when I was in high school in the early 90s, I also heard such people insist that the human genome would never be mapped out.
Anonymous

Recent advances suggest we may be able to extract DNA from hair, so if you come across any stuffed hunting trophies of extinct/endangered animals, let the owners know those taxidermied creatures may have a valuable future. Nothing certain yet, just don’t trash them in some housecleaning or PC event.
Anonymous

The San diego wild animal park has one of the last 7 white rhinos. Those remaining have not successfully bred. It is believed the species will be extinct in our lifetime. Sad.
- francoisroux
  
  Actually white rhinos have two sub species, the Southern and Northern white rhino. Of the Northern subspecies there are thought to be only 8 left in the world all in captivity as you said, but there are over 17000 of the Southern subspecies left. Still not a great number, but they can be saved if care is taken…
  
  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/White_Rhinoceros
Ratdog

Wow, how depressing.

If they were still around, I would have probably called them my favorite animals. I have never seen anything quite like it.
Anonymous

I think the takeaway here is: if you have stripes on the front or rear half of your body, watch the #@&% out.

You could be next, Ring-tailed Lemur.