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Weighing up to 70 pounds, boldly striped thylacines were the largest carnivorous
marsupials of the Australian Quaternary. Species of thylacines once existed
in both Australia and New Guinea, which were united during low sea-level stands.
By 2,000 years ago they had disappeared everywhere except the island of Tasmania.
It is believed that the introduction of the dingo (Australian dog, a breed
of Canis familiaris) by humans around 3,500 yrbp may have been instrumental
in causing the extirpation of thylacines on the Australian mainland. The last
members of T. cynocephalus were intentionally destroyed around the turn
of the century; the species survived in captivity until the 1930s.
Be sure to see a mounted specimen (the real thing!) of this species
at the AMNH! See also: Flannery, T. F., 1994. The Future-Eaters: An Ecological History of the Australasian Lands and People. George Braziller: New York. |
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Protemnodons were once found throughout much of the Australian continent
(and New Guinea), being especially common in the east. While the designation
"giant wallaby" is appropriate for some species of protemnodons,
like P. anak, that weighed 200 pounds or more, other species were much
smaller. Remains of giant wallabies have been found in Pleistocene deposit
38,000 to 40,000 years old, but it is not known whether these dates establish
time of extinction reliably.
Be sure to see a mounted specimen (the real thing!) of this species
at the AMNH! See also: Flannery, T. F., 1994. The Future-Eaters: An Ecological History of the Australasian Lands and People. George Braziller: New York. Flannery, T. F., in press. Emerging patterns in Australasian Quaternary extinctions. In R. D. E. MacPhee (ed.), "Humans and Other Catastrophes: A New Look at Extinctions and the Extinction Process." Plenum Press: New York. |
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Rhino-sized Diprotodon was the largest Quaternary Australian
marsupial, standing over six feet high at the shoulder and weighing
more than a ton. Remarkably, an ancient diprotodon trackway (preserved
footprints) has been discovered at Callabonna, the site of a former
lake in northern South Australia. In addition to the Australian
continent, diprotodons also lived in New Guinea until about 25,000
years ago. When diprotodons died out is not known; there is no
certain evidence that they were hunted by humans. Be sure to see a mounted specimen (the real thing!) of this species at the AMNH!
See also: Dodson, J., R. Fullagar, J. Furby, R. Jones, and I. Prosser, 1993. Humans and megafauna in a late Pleistocene environment from Cuddie Springs, northwestern New South Wales. Archaeology in Oceania 28:94-99. |
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