Talk:Thylacine/Archive 2

Archive 1

Archive 2

Edit suggestion

This text:

"per head. (Current value today, after inflation and introduction of decimal currency: $132.29) for"

should be changed to read

"per head (the equivalent of £100 or more today) for"

This page explains why "$132.29" is far more precise than it ought to be.

71.197.166.72 (talk) 20:28, 13 June 2016 (UTC)

Thanks, Apokryltaros. There's still a stray period in there, though. 71.197.166.72 (talk) 23:42, 16 June 2016 (UTC)

David Fleay said the last Thylacine was a male

Should it be noted that David Fleay (the man who filmed and photographed the last captive Thylacine) said that the last individual was a male?

http://www.naturalworlds.org/thylacine/additional/benjamin/Benjamin_2.htm — Preceding unsigned comment added by Internetnicknamehere (talk • contribs) 10:54, 26 June 2012 (UTC)

The gender of Benjamin is reported inconsistently. Para 1 of "Benjamin and searches" states "Darby also appears to be the source for the claim that the last thylacine was a male; photographic evidence suggests it was female.[77]" Yet in the next para we read: "In 2011, detailed examination of a single frame from the motion film footage confirmed that the thylacine was male." This is inconsistent and should be corrected, whichever is correct (both are sourced).

--121.222.245.180 (talk) 09:18, 30 September 2016 (UTC)

New video

‘Extinct’ Tasmanian Tiger caught on camera? (VIDEO) - RT.com - 17 September 2016 The Cube Root Of Infinity (talk) 11:52, 18 September 2016 (UTC)

The hind feet (from heel to toes) look way too long in comparison. Probably just a dog. Anyway, "with its “prehistoric looking head” catching the woman’s attention." So before 1936 is prehistory now?FunkMonk (talk) 20:26, 18 September 2016 (UTC)

The hind feet are "dog," yet the gait is in no way dog. More like the "gamboling" of a calf or lamb: up-down-up-down. It never trots like a canid does.--75.164.145.192 (talk) 05:11, 26 October 2016 (UTC)

If the hind feet are those of a dog, it is not a thylacine. Gaits can be affected by a million things. The proportions of limbs not. FunkMonk (talk) 07:44, 26 October 2016 (UTC)

Another notable movie + game

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tasmania_Story#Video_game

Heck someone even included the game's opening shot the moment you boot it up. --107.77.207.219 (talk) 00:34, 22 January 2017 (UTC)

Please see Wikipedia:Notability--Mr Fink (talk) 03:09, 22 January 2017 (UTC)

Grammar error?

The last sentence of the 3rd paragraph says "Despite its official classification as extinct, sightings are still reported, though none has been conclusively proven." I believe this is a grammar error, and that the sentence should read as follows:

Despite its official classification as extinct, sightings are still reported, though none have been conclusively proven.

The sightings have not been proven, rather than the sightings has not been proven. Can anybody confirm/correct this?

2600:E000:54:139:9AEE:CBFF:FE03:5E93 (talk) 06:41, 5 March 2016 (UTC)

'None' means 'not one'. Therefore the singular is correct. Akld guy (talk) 05:31, 25 January 2017 (UTC)

No longer extinct

The species status needs to be changed. The Thylacine is no longer considered extinct. They have been found. Someone should edit the page. Please edit this. This information is very important. And people need to know. -A.E.M. 2/2/2017 — Preceding unsigned comment added by 2604:6000:78C3:3200:E02D:4561:B6CF:84E (talk) 23:29, 2 February 2017 (UTC)

The researchers are investigating proof of existence - the study itself is not proof that the species is not extinct.

"A team of investigators from the Centre for Fortean Zoology, which operates from a small farmhouse in north Devon, is currently in Tasmania hunting down clues to prove the thylacine, commonly known as the Tassie tiger, still exists."

Regards  NeoGeneric 💬  01:45, 4 April 2017 (UTC)

Nobody has declared the Thylacine extinct. According to the Tasmanian Parks and Wildlife Service, the Thylacine is listed on their Threatened Species list, and is "presumed extinct": "Listed as presumed extinct under both the Federal and State Threatened Species Protection Acts. This means thylacine have not been officially sighted in the wild or captivity for at least 50 years." http://www.parks.tas.gov.au/index.aspx?base=971 I hope this clarifies the situation. Regards, William Harris • (talk) • 11:59, 22 April 2017 (UTC)

The IUCN Red List says it is extinct, and that is the generally recognized international authority. No one has provided proof otherwise. There have been no verified road kills or other carcasses recovered, and no adequate-quality videos or photographs. —BarrelProof (talk) 21:30, 22 April 2017 (UTC)

"Presumed extinct" may be a semantic remnant of the Endangered Species Protection Act 1992 which classified threatened species as endangered, vulnerable or presumed extinct. It has since been repealed and threatened species are categorised as extinct, extinct in the wild, critically endangered etc. Furthermore, the Threatened Species Kit (2003) which you have linked to is out of date, as noted by the disclaimer, which may be why it uses this old legislative terminology.  NeoGeneric 💬  01:22, 23 April 2017 (UTC)

Based on the evidence provided, that is the official position of the Government of Tasmania. Your comments on how that arose borders on personal conjecture. All that I ask is that people keep an open mind regarding its extinction/non-extinction. Regards, William Harris • (talk) • 21:30, 23 April 2017 (UTC)

"Official position of the Govt of Tasmania"? - you have referenced an outdated resource on the Tas Parks website "specifically designed for school students". I would not call that official. If you want an authoritative answer for the official position of the Govt of Tas, I would suggest the Natural Values Atlas. As I already have a login, to save you and others from having to register for access, here are some of the species details for Thylacinus cynocephalus:

• Threatened?: Yes
• State Schedule: extinct
• National Schedule: Extinct
• Conservation Significance?: No
• Biogeographic Origin: Endemic, considered extinct in Tasmania

But I feel this is all an argument on the semantics of "extinction" - something that was known to exist, but can no longer be found. I wish any researchers best of luck in search of the Thylacine, because it is the sum of good evidence which reinforces the idea that something exists, and the lack of which reinforces the idea it can no longer be found. This is the somewhat fundamental idea behind science.  NeoGeneric 💬  05:00, 24 April 2017 (UTC)

References

Extinction from mainland Australia

"The absolute extinction is attributed to competition from indigenous humans and invasive dingoes."

The "indigenous" should be changed considering context, humans as a species are only native to Africa. Seems oxymoronic to regard humans as native but not dingoes. Please change to "Australian Aboriginals". — Preceding unsigned comment added by 107.77.173.2 (talk) 22:34, 12 June 2017 (UTC)

Cultural references

Crash Bandicoot is a well-known videogame franchise, and Tiny Tiger (one of the recurring bosses) is a Thylacine. Charles Zembillas (one of the main artists for the original trilogy of games) talks about Tiny's origin on his blog, specifically mentioning how his original name was indeed "Tasmanian Tiger". 201.214.215.217 (talk) 22:17, 6 September 2017 (UTC)

• Is this in any way significant on par with it being on coat of arms, focus of literature and so on? We're not supposed to list every inconsequential appearance of a given species in popular media. Some of the entries present now also seem too WP:trivial. We need less fluff, not more. FunkMonk (talk) 22:32, 6 September 2017 (UTC)

i would suggest that some of the fluff can be transmuted and preserved. Put it into a note, where it's existence would be documented, but it would not clutter the main text in the article. 7&6=thirteen (☎) 18:35, 7 September 2017 (UTC)

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Phylogeny

Hello everyone,

I recently completed a research paper regarding the thylacine. I believe It would be beneficial to include more information on the phylogeny of this marsupial. The following is an exert from my project:

"When determining the phylogeny of the thylacine, the evidence, brought forward, supported that the thylacine be placed into its own family- Thylacinidae. The reason for its classification, was based upon its dental and pedal morphology which did not resemble other Australian marsupials (Krajewski et al. 1992). Some argued that the species was closely related to extinct marsupial lineages from South America. However, it was eventually determined that the resemblances, between the two groups, were due to convergent evolution and that evidence supported that the thylacine should be placed under the Australian family Dasyuridae. A later study of basicranial morphology, eventually concluded that the thylacine shared no derived features of either the South American marsupials or the dasyuroids (Krajewski et al. 1992). It was determined that thylacines possessed features that were considered primitive for marsupials based upon DNA analysis of cytochrome b (ex: heart structure) (Krajewski et al. 1992). Further research, conducted on the basal ganglia of the thylacine and Tasmanian devil (the thylacine’s closest relative), showed a more modularized pattern in the cortex of the thylacine while the cortex of the Tasmanian devil was dominated by the putamen (Berns and Ashwell 2017)."

References: Berns, Gregory S., Ashwell, Ken W. S. 2017. Reconstruction of the Cortical Maps of the Tasmanian Tiger and Comparison to the Tasmanian Devil. PLOS ONE. 12(1): 1-12 Krajewski, Carey, Diskell, Amy C., Baverstock, Peter R., Braun, Michael J. 1992. Phylogenetic relationships of the thylacine (Mammalia: Thylacinidae) among dasyuroid marsupials: evidence from cytochrome b DNA sequences. The Royal Society. 250: 19-27 Berns, Gregory S., Ashwell, Ken W. S. 2017. Reconstruction of the Cortical Maps of the Tasmanian Tiger and Comparison to the Tasmanian Devil. PLOS ONE. 12(1): 1-12 Krajewski, Carey, Diskell, Amy C., Baverstock, Peter R., Braun, Michael J. 1992. Phylogenetic relationships of the thylacine (Mammalia: Thylacinidae) among dasyuroid marsupials: evidence from cytochrome b DNA sequences. The Royal Society. 250: 19-27

This is simply food for thought. I found the references and information interesting. Who would ever figure that such a species would spark such a complex debate as to where this animal should be placed on the phylogenetic tree. I would suggest reading the articles I referenced for more detail.

Submission Request by: Patrick Zedalis Pjzedalis (talk) 06:20, 2 December 2017 (UTC)

When genetic diversity declined

Please put that the decline in genetic diversity is thought to have occurred around 70,000 to 120,000 years ago.

note: for some reason, the full citation breaks the talk page. Here's the article title and link (open access) instead: --Elmidae (talk · contribs) 07:39, 13 December 2017 (UTC) Genome of the Tasmanian tiger provides insights into the evolution and demography of an extinct marsupial carnivore. [1]

The best place to put this would be after: "Further work in 2012 examined the relationship of the genetic diversity of the thylacines before their extinction. The results indicated that the last of the thylacines in Australia, on top of the threats from dingoes, had limited genetic diversity, due to their complete geographic isolation from mainland Australia.[76]"

Thank you. --122.108.141.214 (talk) 23:41, 12 December 2017 (UTC)

Done Eggishorn (talk) (contrib) 15:24, 13 December 2017 (UTC)

Semi-protected edit request on 14 December 2017

I request to add a new paragraph to the end of the section titled "Modern research and projects", describing the recently thylacine genome paper published in Nature Ecology & Evolution. As a disclaimer, I am an author on the paper

. I am happy to have an established Wikipedia user amend the text or correct the markup as they see fit. The suggested text for the paragraph is as follows:

A draft genome sequence of the thylacine was produced by Feigin et al. using the DNA extracted of an ethanol-preserved pouch young specimen provided by Museums Victoria. Their work was published in the journal Nature Ecology and Evolution in 2017. Analysis of Retroposon presence/absence patterns supported the basal position of the thylacine within the order Dasyuromorphia and showed considerable incomplete lineage sorting within this clade. Demographic analyses using MSMC suggested that the thylacine had undergone a decline in effective population size, predating the arrival of humans in Australia. However, the researchers noted that similar signals could be the product of a population structure characterised by a large number of demes with low migration, which is highly plausible for a large dispersed predator. Comparative genomic and morphometric analyses revealed that in spite of the morphological convergence between the thylacine (a marsupial) and placental canids, that key developmental genes did not show signatures of adaptive convergence. Rather, they suggested that changes in cis-regulatory regions are more likely drivers of thylacine-canid convergence. Memory-donk (talk) 02:27, 14 December 2017 (UTC)

References

Not done: The study summarized was added by the last edit request and this level of detail obscures the findings. This suggestion is also far, far too technical in phrasing for a general-audience encyclopedia. Any interested reader that can understand this can also follow the link already given and read the abstract themselves. Eggishorn (talk) (contrib) 15:29, 14 December 2017 (UTC)

Duly noted that the paragraph is too technical, but with all due respect this is the largest pieces of modern thylacine research in a decade and is not mentioned in the "Modern research and projects" section at all, while two TED talks (which are not research) get their own paragraph. While the article is cited (for what I'll add is an incorrect interpretation of the results misreported in the popular press, as psmc/msmc does not tell you about genetic diversity, it tells you about effective population size), the fact that the genome was sequenced has not been mentioned anywhere in the article. If you would kindly reconsider I have amended the paragraph to still reflect the general content of the paper but without overly technical detail. Thank you for your time and consideration.

A draft genome sequence of the thylacine was produced by Feigin et al. using the DNA extracted of an ethanol-preserved pouch young specimen provided by Museums Victoria. Their work was published in the journal Nature Ecology and Evolution in 2017. Researchers used the genome to study aspects of the thylacine's evolution and natural history, including the genetic basis of its convergence with canids, clarifying its evolutionary relationships with other marsupials and examining changes in its population size over time.

 — Preceding unsigned comment added by Memory-donk (talk • contribs) 01:15, 15 December 2017 (UTC) 

@Memory-donk:, as noted above, this study is already in the article, although in a different section. Please read the "Extinction from Mainland Australian" section, specifically this: "Further investigations in 2017 showed evidence that this decline in genetic diversity started long before the arrival of humans in Australia, possibly starting as early as 72-120 thousand years before the present." This is cited to the exact study you are referencing. The origin, etc. of the genome sequence is of specialist interest and, as I said earlier, anyone interested in that level of detail can simply read the study (or at least the abstract). Eggishorn (talk) (contrib) 02:04, 15 December 2017 (UTC)

References

Hi again @Eggishorn. If you read my comment, I point out that while the article cited is the same, the statement that you have highlighted is factually incorrect (I say this being the lead author on the paper and understanding it well) and does not report the genome being sequenced. You have also neglected to address that this modern research is not presented in the modern research section, an organisational oversight. Your suggestion that 'they can look at the abstract' can equally well be applied to everything else in this entire article that links to a published paper. The fact that primary sources exist hardly abrogates the need for an encyclopedia to summarise that work. I have amended the paragraph to remove excess detail to address the main substantial criticism you levelled (please see previous comment).

@Memory-donk:, could you please propose an alteration to "Further investigations in 2017 showed evidence that this decline in genetic diversity started long before the arrival of humans in Australia, possibly starting as early as 72-120 thousand years before the present." that would make it more accurate? Then perhaps @Eggishorn: may be prevailed upon to modify that statement. --122.108.141.214 (talk) 03:49, 15 December 2017 (UTC)

@122.108.141.214 Hi, yes, I already have suggested text in my paragraph intended for the Modern research section. I was told it was too technical. I'll try to summarise it more simply here, but its not a straightforward result:

Demographic analyses of the thylacine suggested a decline in effective population size starting as early as 72-120 thousand years before the present. However, similar results can be caused by population structures that are consistent with a large, geographically dispersed predator.

The paragraph that the genome paper is currently cited in here is about genetic diversity. Given that this result is not about genetic diversity, it seems pretty clear that even the corrected sentence does not belong in that discussion. A further difficulty is that our interpretation of the results are conditional (i.e. we can't distinguish between effective population size trends and population structure). More importantly though, this whole analysis was not the main emphasis of the genome paper, which focused much more heavily on the thylacine's convergent evolution with canids. I sincerely believe it would be more appropriate to update the modern research section, as has been done repeatedly through the years, to include the most modern research on the species. The amended paragraph I provided in my second post does this reasonably well. I apologise that this is taking up your time, but to me this seems like a very appropriate update to the research section, at least more appropriate than TED talks which are not research. Thank you again for your consideration. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Memory-donk (talk • contribs) 04:15, 15 December 2017 (UTC)

Thanks for the clarification. Part of the problem is that the article could use a solid literature review to bring it up to date.

Updating the "current research" section here to include your own research needs to be handled under Wikipedia's conflict of interest guidelines.  Please read these.  

My gut feeling, for what it's worth, is that summarising the result in another section, using your paper, would be more acceptable, as a third-party source would be needed to say 'this genome paper is important in the field of modern thylacine research'. (If this is not how the others are treated, then perhaps that's wrong.)

Alternatively, a literature review and rewrite of the "current research" section to include all the relevant strands and competing theories (as in Homo floresiensis) may be acceptable.

Was your research done on a Tasmanian thylacine, or a mainlander? Perhaps the information on the decline in effective population size and population structures (not sure which type of pop. structure is referenced here - if we wikilink technical terms, then the text is better for our general audience) could be presented in the extinction section ( Thylacine#Extinction) instead?

Hope this helps, @Memory-donk:. --122.108.141.214 (talk) 05:27, 15 December 2017 (UTC)

Hi @122.108.141.214. Thank you again for your suggestion. My understanding of the Modern research section based on what has been added since I started watching this page in ~2009, is that it is simply describing what the modern studies on the thylacine have been. There doesn't seem to be any mention of the relatively importance of any research in this section. I was very careful not to make any claims regarding importance of the study because it is my own work. I was also careful to declared myself as an author up front in my initial edit request...

"As a disclaimer, I am an author on the paper. I am happy to have an established Wikipedia user amend the text or correct the markup as they see fit."

...and rather than using my full name as has been done for every other researcher mentioned in the section, I used Feigin et al., the standard way of referring to a paper with multiple authors.

I have looked over the COI guidelines and am very confident that neither of my suggested paragraphs are problematic. The COI guidelines provide suggestions for what editors should consider when handling both paid and unpaid COIs in the section Dealing with edit requests from COI or paid editors. I have made a disclosure of COI (happy to add the appropriate markup), I amended the paragraph to remove unnecessary detail, I have not left out important details (for a lay audience), I have avoided non-neutral language (if I am wrong about that please help me improve it), I included no personal websites and I am unpaid. Moreover, the guidelines explicitly state that using material that you have published is allowed within reason, but only if it is relevant (based on other material in Modern research it certainly is relevant) and is not excessive (the first more technical version is < 200 words and the second non-technical version is less than 90 words, added to a >5000 word article).

Both versions of the paragraph are compose of matter-of-fact statements that a genome sequence had been published in W journal and that X, Y and Z were done (the second version probably being more appropriate for the encyclopedia). I don't believe its necessary for a third party source to confirm that this is modern research as it is both modern (2017) and verifiably peer-reviewed research (Nature E&E). As this is the first genome analysis of the thylacine, there are no current competing theories on the genetic basis of its convergence with canids, but naturally they would also constitute modern research and would also be appropriate for this section.

As I said initially, I would be perfectly happy with another editor updating the article appropriately to reflect that a new study has been published, as long as the information is accurately reported. Placing an update in the modern research section without qualifiers of importance seems like the best way to avoid a problematic COI. It just seems bizarre to me that every genetic paper on the thylacine that has ever been published would be included in the modern research section except for the genome paper. It may be my own failing, but I can not grasp why this paper would be the only paper that would not belong in the same section.

To answer your other questions, the individual sequenced was a Tasmanian specimen, but Tasmania was only isolated ~14,000 years ago, and the demography covers much earlier times than that (i.e. when the mainland and Tasmanian populations were one). I did wikilink the technical terms in my original paragraph and also described the nature of the population structure, but it was deemed too technical by the previous editor, so I removed mention of those details (personally I don't think it was so technical given that wikipedia has good articles for each of the technical topics I had previously linked to). Finally, as I tried to explain before, there is no relationship between loss of diversity/extinction and the PSMC analysis we did. That was the thing that was misreported in the popsci press. PSMC covers the time prior to the separation of Tasmania and again, does not reflect loss of genetic diversity that contributed to extinction. The paper does not study any factors related to the thylacine's extinction so I don't believe that it would make sense to put it in the extinction section.

For your reference I've re-copied the two suggested paragraphs below.

First suggested version (more technical plus wikilinks): A draft genome sequence of the thylacine was produced by Feigin et al. using the DNA extracted of an ethanol-preserved pouch young specimen provided by Museums Victoria. Their work was published in the journal Nature Ecology and Evolution in 2017. Analysis of Retroposon presence/absence patterns supported the basal position of the thylacine within the order Dasyuromorphia and showed considerable incomplete lineage sorting within this clade. Demographic analyses using MSMC suggested that the thylacine had undergone a decline in effective population size, predating the arrival of humans in Australia. However, the researchers noted that similar signals could be the product of a population structure characterised by a large number of demes with low migration, which is highly plausible for a large dispersed predator. Comparative genomic and morphometric analyses revealed that in spite of the morphological convergence between the thylacine (a marsupial) and placental canids, that key developmental genes did not show signatures of adaptive convergence. Rather, they suggested that changes in cis-regulatory regions are more likely drivers of thylacine-canid convergence.

Second suggested version (non-technical): A draft genome sequence of the thylacine was produced by Feigin et al. using the DNA extracted of an ethanol-preserved pouch young specimen provided by Museums Victoria. Their work was published in the journal Nature Ecology and Evolution in 2017. Researchers used the genome to study aspects of the thylacine's evolution and natural history, including the genetic basis of its convergence with canids, clarifying its evolutionary relationships with other marsupials and examining changes in its population size over time.

• Rather than lump it all in a "research" section, the information given in the paper should be spun off to relevant sections of the article. Information about evolution, behaviour, and affinities belong in the sections about these subjects. Putting the information in its proper context will also make it more understandable, and we will prevent having a wall of text summarising an entire paper in one paragraph. FunkMonk (talk) 15:45, 18 December 2017 (UTC)

@FunkMonk I agree and I would be happy to do so in the near future with help/input from other interested editors. For the moment I was updating the information in article to be current, and to do so in a way that best fits with its present structure. The Modern research and projects section has been in this article since at least 2009, so the article is probably overdue for a reformat. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Memory-donk (talk • contribs) 09:12, 19 December 2017 (UTC)

References

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