Exhaust Notes talks to us about tracking Tigers with Toyota

The team over at Exhaust Notes caught up with some CFZers recently to talk about the recent Tasmanian expedition sponsored by Toyota Australia.

Here's a snippet:

Why did Toyota Australia sponsor your trips?

Toyota Australia agreed to sponsor our trips after we approached them with our idea. They thought the premise was exciting and a good fit for their 4WD vehicles; popular in regional and rural Australia. We were attracted to Toyota because of its solid reputation as a manufacturer of high performance off-road vehicles, and their popularity in the bush. It was a perfect match for us really, and meant we were able to do so much more than we had originally planned.

Get the full story over at Exhaust Notes.

On the trail of the Tiger

NSW man Michael Williams is on his eighth Toyota-sponsored trip in 10 years to the State searching for evidence the Tasmanian tiger walks the Apple Isle - 29 years after it was officially declared dead and gone.

The last known thylacine died in captivity on November 7, 1936.

"Initially I wasn't that much interested in the tiger and we did a book called Australian Big Cats: An Unnatural History of Panthers, which is folklore on the big cat mythology on the mainland," Mr Williams said.

"While we were doing that, we started to get Tassie tiger reports and we started to follow that up.

"I initially thought it couldn't exist and the quality of witnesses really surprised me.

"When I'm dealing with multiple witnesses especially on the same event, I just don't think that everyone of them is lying to or hoaxing me.

"When a husband and wife are sitting there and saying to me in 1994, 2004, or whatever, 'we saw three animals cross the road in front of us with a funny head, weird gait and stripes', I think they are telling the truth.

"All up, I have spoken to about 30 to 40 people."

Mr Williams said the last reported sighting he had received was 13 months ago when multiple witnesses allegedly watched a large adult male thylacine cross the road in the North-East.

He said if the carnivorous marsupial was still around, it would most likely be in the North-West or North East.

"The technology that I think will prove they do exist will be 'Joe Tourist' driving around with those crash cameras," Mr Williams said.

"At the moment I am primarily collecting reports and trying to find locations, farms and areas where the highest probability of me finding the tiger is.

"I'm looking for game trails to put cameras on."

Mr Williams said there were five other people in Tasmania searching for evidence and was excited for what may be discovered.

He said the best secondary evidence available was a coloured image of a thylacine's footprint, allegedly shot dead in 1990 near Adamsfield, published in Col Bailey's book.

"The original photo is in colour which means there was an animal existing, after the black and white era, so it was up to 1991 that they were still around, we believe," he said.

"What the museum does is play a subtle game with the truth, they go 'there is no secondary evidence'.

"If you speak to either of the museums when they get scats, they say 'this could be a Tassie tiger'.

"Their question is 'are you going to do DNA for it', and they say they 'don't have the budget'.

"If you go to the museum in Hobart they now use the term 'biological extinction', which is quite a weird argument.

"It means that it has got such a small genetic pool it has very little effect on the local fauna."

Mr Williams said he had been stalled by some Tasmanian private land owners, not wanting him to explore their land for various reasons.

"Eventually, we think it is worth a book - and after finding some really compelling evidence," he said.

"I think we will keep coming back for another 10 years.

"By that stage we will either be going 'yes we proved it' or know we are just deluded."

Mr Williams heads home on March 29 and is asking private land owners and those who believe they know where the animal is to call 0416 303 371.

Read the full story at The Examiner.

New Australian book queries Tasmanian Tiger extinction...

Does the Tasmanian Tiger still roam the island state, parts of the Australian mainland, and the northern land mass of Irian Jaya-Papua New Guinea? 

Despite being hunted to extinction in the early part of the 20th century, the Tasmanian Tiger continues to stalk the imaginations of people the world over. What's more, hundreds of reports of the striped dog-like marsupial with the fearsome gaping jaw are made each year in Australia. 

In The Tasmanian Tiger: Extinct or Extant?, biologists, geneticists, naturalists, and academics explore the evidence for and against the continuing existence of Thylacinus cynocephalus.

Featuring essays by Peter Chapple, Ned Terry, Col Bailey, Bob Paddle, Nick Mooney, Tony Healy, Paul Cropper, Andrew Pask, Malcolm Smith, Gary Opit and Michael Williams.

Toyota backs biggest search yet for Tasmanian Tiger

Biggest search yet for elusive Tasmanian Tiger

An international team of naturalists from the Centre for Fortean Zoology will go in search of the Tasmanian Tiger, Thylacinus cynocephalus, in one of the biggest concentrated searches yet for the elusive animal, which was officially declared extinct in the early 1980s.

Expedition leader Mike Williams said the trip – generously sponsored by Toyota Australia, and the first of several to be mounted by the group - will explore densely forested areas in the State’s north and south west.

“If we didn’t think there was even a slim chance of stumbling upon evidence in the form of scats, hair or footage, then we wouldn’t have committed to this expedition,” he said.

“Good quality Thylacine sightings are still being reported right across the state of Tasmania – 77 years after the last Thylacine died in captivity in a Tasmanian Zoo, and 27 years after it was declared extinct by the Tasmanian Government.

“A secondary aim of the trip is to look for evidence of healthy Tasmanian Devil, Sarcophilus Harrisii, populations in remote wilderness areas.

“We will also be monitoring for the presence of the No. 1 enemy of the State, Vulpes vulpes, the fox, rumoured to have established itself in Tasmania, and presently the subject of a multi-million dollar government-sponsored hunt.

“Let’s hope between our resources, those of other independent researchers, and the government’s, something comes to light – preferably a Thylacine over a fox - in the next 24 months.”

The team is highly experienced; several members have been on expeditions all over the world, including to Sumatra in 2011 in search of a mystery primate, the so-called Orang pendek, an as-yet unclassified species attracting serious scientific interest.

The team will be traversing the difficult terrain in two Toyota LandCruiser 200s – the luxury Sahara V8 Turbo-Diesel and the GX V8 Turbo-Diesel – and using sophisticated game cameras, starlight scopes, and dash-cameras.

Expedition team members include: Dr Chris Clark (UK), Richard Freeman (UK), Dr Hannah Jenkins (TAS/AUS), Tania Poole (VIC/AUS), Michael Williams (NSW/AUS), Rebecca Lang (NSW/AUS), Tony Healy (ACT/AUS), Orrin Hare (UK), Lisa Malam (UK), and Jonathan McGowan (UK).

Mike Williams can be contacted on 0416 303 371.

Seen a Tiger? Share your sighting at cfzaustralia@yahoo.com.au

Mike Williams holds a replica Thylacine skull next to the
Toyota LandCruiser 200 GX Turbo-Diesel.

Go black and white for Tassie Devils on May 24

Go Black and White on May 24

Help raise funds for the Tasmanian Devil through Black & White Day!

We are calling on all schools, businesses and community organisations to get involved in Black & White Day - we hope you might be interested in helping the Tassie devils. Through the combined effort of schools & businesses around Australia Black & White Day raised over $20,000! All money raised supported key research and management programs aimed at keeping the Tassie devil alive in the wild.

This year the official date for Black & White Day is Friday 24 May 2013, however you can participate on any day throughout the year – whatever works for you, your students or colleagues.

Black & White Day was created by Nature Nic (Nicholas Bonnitcha) seven years ago. Through Nature Nic’s involvement Black & White Day has raised over $100,000. This is through the ongoing support of schools and businesses around Australia.

What you can do?
• Dress in black & white ... it’s easy – everyone has something black or white in their wardrobe (shoes, socks, shoelaces, ribbons, t-shirt ...)
• Have a morning tea
• Do a talent quest
• Guess how many jelly beans are in the jar
• Incorporate Black & White Day as part of Endangered Species awareness and include it in the learning programme.
Whatever you choose, encourage a gold coin donation.

How the Appeal can help:
• Posters
• Brochures with information about Tasmanian Devils
• Stickers
• Donation boxes
• Teacher’s Kit which has a range of educational material for all ages

If you’d like to register your interest or would like the organisers to send some of the information to your school please contact them on 03 6324 3527 or email Devil.Appeal@utas.edu.au

Tassie Devils halt mining in Tarkine - for now

An environmental group fighting to save Tasmanian devils has secured a temporary halt to construction at a proposed iron ore mine in the Tarkine.

An injunction was granted in the Federal Court on May 10, delaying work by Shree Minerals at the proposed Nelson Bay River mine.

Environmental group Save the Tarkine sought the temporary injunction, arguing that it was inappropriate to start work on the mine while the legality of the project was set to be challenged in court.

Read the story in The Mercury.

Thylacines of the New Guinea Highlands

Everyone has heard of the Tasmanian Tiger.

But during the Pleistocene epoch, ending a mere 11,700 years ago, the Thylacine also existed on New Guinea, and mainland Australia.

In a new blog post, Dr Karl Shuker has explored the not so well known modern-day reports of suspiciously thylacine-like beasts in New Guinea, specifically Irian Jaya (New Guinea's less-explored western, Indonesian half), where such creatures are referred to by local people as the dobsegna.

Read more over at Dr Karl Shuker's blog.

Archer: Col Bailey's thylacine sighting credible

Noted zoologist Professor Mike Archer, a former director of the Australian Museum, has said despite his professional scepticism, he respects Tiger Hunter Col Bailey's theory that a population of thylacines still exists in Tasmania.

In a recent interview with ABC Radio, Archer and Bailey talked about Thylacines and Col's new book, Shadow of the Thylacine, and his sighting of a Thylacine in the Weld Valley in Tasmania.

"Of course I want to believe in Col's story...every fibre in me resonates along with the same view that Col has...this is Australia's king of beasts, this is the most magnificent creature Australia has ever produced," Archer said.

"I feel...a sense of intense excitement that maybe somehow it has survived over the years. My scepticism, of course, and I have discussed this with Col, it is the scepticism of a scientist. It's very hard to test sightings, these are personal things...but when I know the man, like I know Col, that's not just a normal sighting, if you like, that's coming from a really credible person whose judgement I would never question. All I can say is I wish I'd been there with him."

Professor Archer is hopeful of one day reviving a project to bring the thylacine back to life by using DNA from museum specimens to clone them.

Listen to the interview here.

Disease not a factor in Tassie Tiger extinction: Adelaide University

Tasmanian Tigers at Beaumaris Zoo, Hobart c 1918.
Reproduced with permission from the Tasmanian Museum and Art Gallery
via University of Adelaide Marketing Communications team.

Humans alone were responsible for the demise of Australia's iconic extinct native predator, the Tasmanian Tiger or thylacine, a new study led by the University of Adelaide has concluded.

Using a new population modelling approach, the study contradicts the widespread belief that disease must have been a factor in the thylacine's extinction.

The thylacine was a unique marsupial carnivore found throughout most of Tasmania before European settlement in 1803. Between 1886 and 1909, the Tasmanian government encouraged people to hunt thylacines and paid bounties on over 2000 thylacine carcasses. Only a handful of animals were located after the bounty was lifted and the last known thylacine was captured from the wild in 1933.

"Many people, however, believe that bounty hunting alone could not have driven the thylacine extinct and therefore claim that an unknown disease epidemic must have been responsible," says the project leader, Research Associate Dr Thomas Prowse, School of Earth and Environmental Sciences and the Environment Institute.

"We tested this claim by developing a 'metamodel' - a network of linked species models - that evaluated whether the combined impacts of Europeans could have exterminated the thylacine, without any disease."

The mathematical models used by conservation biologists to simulate the fate of threatened species under different management strategies (called population viability analysis or PVA) traditionally neglect important interactions between species. The researchers designed a new approach to PVA that included species interactions.

"The new model simulated the directs effects of bounty hunting and habitat loss and, importantly, also considered the indirect effects of a reduction in the thylacine's prey (kangaroos and wallabies) due to human harvesting and competition from millions of introduced sheep," Dr Prowse says.

"We found we could simulate the thylacine extinction, including the observed rapid population crash after 1905, without the need to invoke a mystery disease.

"We showed that the negative impacts of European settlement were powerful enough that, even without any disease epidemic, the species couldn't escape extinction."

The study 'No need for disease: testing extinction hypotheses for the thylacine using multi-species metamodels', which also involved Professors Corey Bradshaw and Barry Brook from the University of Adelaide's Environment Institute, Professor Chris Johnson from the University of Tasmania, and Dr Bob Lacy, Chicago Zoological Society, has been published online in the Journal of Animal Ecology.

Thylacine caught on video?

We're a little late in covering this, but here it is anyway - a thylacine (or three) on video? - filmed in October 2012 in the Tasmanian wilderness.

While we commend Victorian researcher Murray McAllister on doing the hard yards, we're not so sure he has captured evidence of Australia's iconic extinct marsupial.

Nevertheless, his camera placement yielded amazing footage of quolls, a wallaby and Tasmanian devils. Not bad!

What do you think? Is there a Thylacine in there?

2013 a critical year for Tasmanian Devil

Kudos to the Hobart Mercury, which has written a stirring editorial about the fate of the Tasmanian Devil, earmarking 2013 as a critical year for the survival of the species.

"Imagine the first time a British settler heard the throaty growls and blistering howls of a pack of hungry Tasmanian devils devouring a carcase in the darkness of a forest at night.

"It must have been terrifying. There are few sounds so other-worldly as a devil's banshee wail.

"During the day, the British convicts, soldiers and settlers would have seen very little of the nocturnal marsupial carnivores but when dusk fell the husky yap, yap yap of a thylacine on the hunt for prey would have filled the night air along with devilish screams and the inimitable and bizarre coughing and barking of possums..."

Read this most excellent piece in full here.

Shrinking Devil gene pool not settlers' fault

European settlers were not responsible for thinning the gene pool of the Tasmanian devil, new research discussed over at The Conversation has found.

Tasmanian devils are currently under threat due to the spread of an aggressive facial tumour, one of only three recorded types of contagious cancer. The disease spreads so readily because genetic diversity in devils' immune systems is low. It is passed from devil to devil through biting.

It had previously been assumed that this lack of diversity was due to population decline that occurred as a result of European settlement.

OOPA: Monster crab from Tasmania emigrates to UK

Claude the Tasmanian giant crab, was saved from death when the fisherman who caught him sold him to a British aquarium  for £3000.

A 29-hour plane journey from Australia later, and a short stint in quarantine, Claude is now ready to meet the British public at the Sea Life centre in Weymouth, Dorset.

The hefty crustacean weighs a mighty 15lb with a 15-inch shell – 100 times bigger than a standard UK shore crab - but will grow to double his weight.

Read more at The Daily Mail.

Dr Eric Guiler on the Thylacine

Thylacine ( Thylacinus cyanocephaplus )

The thylacine (also known as the Tasmanian tiger or Tasmanian wolf) formerly ranged over all of mainland Australian as well as Tasmania. Fossil remains have even been found in New Guinea. Some 3000 years ago, thylacines vanished from mainland Australia and their distribution was confined to the island of Tasmania where they occurred throughout the State.

The thylacine is the shape and size of a big dog, the largest one being measured at 9"6" (290 cm) from the nose to the tip of the long tail, (but see also this interesting web resource). Their colour varied from light sandy fawn to a darkish brown with dark stripes over the rump and back. The number of stripes varied between 13 and 21. The stripes extended onto the tail and one reached down the outside of the thigh. The belly was a creamy colour. The tail was not like that of a dog but more an extension of the body like that of a kangaroo; the tail did not have a long hairy brush.

We know surprisingly little about the the biology of the thylacine. It was formerly found in the open forest and coastal scrub habitats. It did not live in thick rain forests. At no time, since European settlement, was it a common species. The capture of a specimen always aroused local interest. There is evidence that thylacines were most abundant around 1890-1902. Thylacines bred once per annum, probably in December, and up to 4 young were carried in the pouch of the female which opened backwards. By July-August the young were too big for the pouch and were left in a sheltered place while the female hunted for food. Later the young followed the mother while she hunted.

Thylacines were not pack hunters. Single animals ran down their prey by persistent chase rather than by speed. They required a large home range, about 40 sq km being the minimum area, although 80 sq km would be more appropriate in most habitats. They stayed in their home range but, as far as is known, they were not territorial. Their food consisted of wallabies and smaller animals. It is believed that thylacines ate only fresh killed meat and never returned to a kill. This was important because it means that they could not be poisoned by baiting carcasses.

But why were thylacines killed? When the European settlers arrived in 1802 they brought sheep with them and the flocks provided a source of easily accessible food for thylacines. Many sheep were killed from about 1830 and thylacines were blamed. However, most of the deaths were probably caused by wild dogs, aborigines and vagabonds. The Government introduced a bounty scheme from 1888-1908, paying £1 (=$2) for an adult and 10 shillings (=$1) for pups. Over 2,200 were killed, as well as many upon which no bounty was claimed.

The bounty scheme, combined with habitat alteration, disturbance to the home range and a possible disease, drastically reduced the numbers of thylacines until around 1920 there were only a few left. The last thylacine to be shot in the wild was in 1932 and the last to die in captivity was in 1936. Interestingly, all the photographs of live thylacines are of captive animals; there are no photographs of the animals in the wild. There are no substantiated accounts of thylacines wilfully attacking a human. They would bite to defend themselves when cornered, or trying to escape. They seem to avoid human contact as much as possible.

Reports of alleged thylacine sightings have been received over the past 60 or so years but none have been unambigously substantiated by positive field evidence. The number of reports has diminished over the last 5-10 years and it must be concluded that, unfortunately, the thylacine is now extinct.

Prepared by Dr Eric Guiler, 
Honorary Research Associate 
School of Zoology, University of Tasmania

The Thylacine on the Central Plateau

Is Devil cancer a parasite?

Scientists say strong evidence is emerging that the catastrophic Tasmanian devil facial tumour disease should be regarded as a parasite.

The disease, which has wiped out 80 per cent of the devil population in the wild, has been treated as a transmissible cancer.

But immunologist Greg Woods from the Menzies Institute says it also shows many classic parasitical characteristics.

"It's a cancer and a parasite," he told AAP before delivering his findings to the Australian Society for Parasitology's conference in Launceston.

"It goes from host to host and using each host to survive, and it will damage its host and move on to the next host so it's behaving like what we classically regard as being a parasite."

Also like a bona fide parasite, it uses the host's natural behaviour to spread itself, in this case the devil's insatiable appetite for violence.

"You drink water so you pick up a parasite," Associate Professor Woods said.

"With the devil, the tumour gets on the teeth and devils bite each other."

There is other evidence too - the disease avoids the immune response of the devil by covering itself in its host's proteins.

The question remains, though, whether it can be considered a "perfect" parasite like malaria because it has not yet managed to survive in more than one species.

But it is its parasitic behaviour that makes the tumour disease fundamentally different from the form of cancer that humans contract, Prof Woods said.

"The question is: Are cancers parasites because they live off the host?" he said.

"The thing about the cancer that us humans get is that once the human dies or recovers the cancer dies as well, whereas this tumour goes from host to host."

The origin of the disease has been traced to a single cell in a single female devil in the 1990s but it is unknown how she contracted it.

http://www.adelaidenow.com.au/news/breaking-news/devils-disease-could-be-a-parasite/story-e6frea7l-1226415006284

Scientists are in a race against the clock to find a cure, with some estimates suggesting devils in the wild could be extinct in 25 years, and there have been few breakthroughs.

The Observer Tree - fight to save a Tassie forest

Perched 60m up an ancient gum tree in a remote part of south-west Tasmania, Miranda Gibson's tree-top home has a spectacular view across one of the biggest untouched tracts of temperate rainforest left in the southern hemisphere.

For more than three months, 30-year-old Gibson has been living high above the canopy floor that is the home to some of Australia's most threatened indigenous wildlife, including the Tasmanian devil and spotted tail quolls. Flying overhead are the equally threatened Tasmanian white goshawks and wedge-tailed eagles.

But Gibson's arboreal home is under imminent threat. These ancient forests are currently unprotected and could be destroyed by logging any day.

In a dramatic bid to save the trees and its wildlife from the chop, Gibson has created the Observer Tree, a global media centre bristling with the latest digital technology to bear witness to the encroaching bulldozers and loggers.

"My aim has been to bring the images of the forests and the truth about the ongoing logging of these areas to the international community and beam my forest protection message across the world," says Gibson.

Maria Island considered for 'insurance' Devil colony

Tasmania’s Parks and Wildlife Service is considering a proposal to set-up a healthy population of Tasmanian Devils on Maria Island.

The PWS is seeking community comment on the translocation proposal, put forward by the Save the Tasmanian Devil Program.

The Minister for Environment, Parks and Heritage, Brian Wightman, said the proposal would initially release up to 50 devils into Maria Island National Park, to establish a wild, free-ranging, disease-free population.

“Our scientists are thinking creative and working extremely hard to help save this precious iconic species,” Mr Wightman said.

“The Save the Tasmanian Devil Program has identified Maria Island as a potential site because of its size, appropriate habitat, and a large suite of prey species for the Tasmanian devil.

“Other benefits include full-time Parks and Wildlife Service staff, and the fact that the only vehicles on the island are PWS ones – reducing the threat of road-kill,” he said.

The Maria Island National Park Plan of Management requires a comprehensive assessment before introducing a new animal to the island - to examine possible environmental, social and economic impacts, along with possible mitigation efforts.

A Development Proposal and Environmental Management Plan will be advertised on Saturday 24 March. It examines the possible impacts of introducing Tasmanian Devils to the Island, and provides an opportunity for community comment on the proposal.

The Save the Tasmanian Devil Program has been carrying out extensive wildlife monitoring and impact assessments, as well as seeking required approvals under State and Commonwealth legislation.

As the land manager of Maria Island, the PWS also has requirements to follow as part of assessing these type of proposals.

“We make these decisions cautiously, and with extensive research, to ensure it’s the right decision for both the Tasmanian Devils and the environment of Maria Island,” Mr Wightman said.

The Save the Tasmanian Devil Program Manager, Andrew Sharman, said the assessment process being undertaken by the Parks and Wildlife Service is the next step in the assessment and approvals process.

“We have been undertaking wildlife monitoring on the island over the last 18 months to ensure we have the best information available for monitoring long-term impacts on the island’s species,” Mr Sharman said.

“An extensive planning process has been also undertaken which has provided scientific and wildlife expert input. The translocation proposal has also been assessed under the Environment Protection and Biodiversity Conservation Act 1999 and has been approved to proceed,” he said.

Mr Sharman said the proposal is another measure for securing the ongoing survival of the Tasmanian devil in the wild.

“Tasmanian devils are facing a major threat to their long term survival in the wild, with the Devil Facial Tumour Disease (DFTD) resulting in a population decline of more than 80 per cent since the disease was first recorded in 1996,” Mr Sharman said.

“Despite major advances in knowledge about this disease, the only tool currently available to break the transmission cycle of the disease is to place healthy devils in situations where they will not encounter diseased individuals.

“The aim of translocating Tasmanian devils to Maria Island is to establish a wild, breeding, DFTD-free population to preserve important traits that may be required for future introductions of devils back to the Tasmanian mainland.

“Island translocations such as this one could provide an ecologically and economically sustainable solution to managing insurance populations,” he said.

The Development Proposal and Environmental Management Plan is available at the PWS website at www.parks.tas.gov.au.

Hard copies are available at Service Tasmania shops.

The public comment period closes on 27 April, 2012.

Michael Sharland and the search for the Thylacine

In 1938, Michael Sharland led a Royal Zoological Society trip to the western Tasmania in search of the thylacine. They found evidence of existence of the thylacine, bringing back stories, photographs and casts of footprints (though they did not see an actual animal). 

In his report, Sharland recommended that an area of the NW be reserved for the protection of the thylacine. These photographs were taken by Sharland of thylacines in the Hobart Zoo (above) and of the hunt (below).

"IN SEARCH OF THE THYLACINE"

Tasmanian Expedition Described

Describing an expedition made late In 1938 to the country between the Gordon River and the Frenchman's Cap, a booklet by M. S. R. Sharland, of Sydney, entitled "In Search of the Thylacine," contains much interesting information about the fast-disappearing marsupial wolf, or, as it is more commonly known, the Tasmanian "tiger".

Mr. Sharland explains that the thylacine exists today as but a remnant of the numbers which, 50 or so years ago, roamed the countryside, feeding on marsupials and sheep. Today it is seen only by the few trappers and prospectors who venture into the remote parts of Tasmania.

Mr. Sharland is an expert on Tasmanian fauna, and his opinions and recommendations must he seriously considered. On this expedition he represented the Royal Zoological Society, and his principal object was to determine to what extent the country was inhabited by the thylacine and to examine the area generally to decide whether it was suitable for a faunal sanctuary.

Mr. Sharland stresses the fact that the thylacine is no longer a menace to   sheep owners, since it is now isolated in remote parts of the State, and that the animal possesses a unique scientific value. Sanctuaries are needed for its protection in areas whore it is likely to be affected adversely by encroaching settlement. He suggests that the area comprising the Raglan and Collingwood ranges and the north-western slopes of the Frenchman's Cap might be set aside as a sanctuary.

Tasmanian beach yields familiar fossil

When Hobart couple Bob and Penny Tyson went fossil-hunting on a Tasmanian beach, they weren't expecting to find a rare 250-million-year-old specimen embedded in the rocks.

The remains were of a dicynodont, an early ancestor of modern-day mammals, and it was the first specimen to ever be discovered so far south.

Roughly the size of a cow, the plant-eating animal had two tusks and a horny beak.

Queensland Museum palaeontologist Andrew Rozefelds says they lived on every continent, including Antarctica. But until now, the only Australian specimen was found in Queensland almost 30 years ago.

The fossil is now being stored at the Tasmanian Museum.