Explantion
Explantion
Explantion
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years ago the numbers of these ancient thylacines began to decline. By
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about 3 million years ago, only one species was left...
17 About 4,000 years ago, these vanished completely Australia, Tasmania was
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Tasmanian then the last remaining place where thylacines existed. They ruled the
animal life of that island unchallenged until Europeans with sheep, dogs,
and a great indifference to native flora and fauna, seem to have brought
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18 about their extinction. In 1936, the last captive was in Tasmanian bush, but
Europeans no definitive evidence has been found. Despite this, there are many who keep
searching.
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in
19 B Randolph Rose, Associate Professor of Zoology at the University of Tasmania
says that he dreamed of seeing a thylacine, but is now convinced that his
will go unfulfilled. The consensus among conservationists is that usually; any
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animal with a population base of less than 1,000 is headed for extinction within
60 years,” says Rose. “Sixty years ago, there was only one thylacine that we
or
know of, and that was in Hobart Zoo,” he says. Take it from me, the tiger is
gone. ...
20 A Hans Naarding, whose sighting of a striped animal two decades ago was the
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there?' Sure, 'Naarding says '! know the vast south-west wilderness of
Tasmania well. They could survive ... (But if this is the case, it will not be long
before they do disappear completely.' Naarding believes that any discovery
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coelacanth,
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23 A When the news broke, said Naarding. 'I was besieged by television crews,
including four or five from Japan, and others from the United Kingdom,
Germany, New Zealand and South America.
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24 D Wildlife biologist Nick Mooney has the unenviable task of investigating all so-
called sightings of the tiger. It was Mooney who was first consulted in late
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February 2005 about the authenticity of new digital photographic images of
a thylacine allegedly taken by a tourist. On the face value, Mooney says, this
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particular account of a sighting and the photographs submitted as proof
amount to one of the most convincing cases for the species survival that he
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has seen...
25 B In 1981, Dutch-born zoologist Hans Naarding was in Tasmania conducting a
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as about the size of a large dog, but with slightly sloping hindquarters and a
fairly thick tail continuing straight on from its backbone. He said that it had 12
distinct stripes on its back, running down to the point where the tail began. He
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reported the sighting to the Director of Tasmania's National Parks. When the
news broke, said Naarding. 'I was besieged by television crews, including four
or five from Japan, and others from the United Kingdom, Germany, New
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coelacanth, with its 'proto legs', was thought to have died out with the
dinosaurs 700 million years ago until a specimen was dragged to the
surface in a shark net off the coast of South Africa in 1938.