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The External Anatomy
of the Thylacine
Sexual dimorphism
(continued):
The Mercury newspaper
of the 29th July 1905 (p. 5) notes:
"A native tiger over
5ft. in length and large in frame was shot by Mr. R. Hughes at Upper Huon
on July 25".
The Launceston Examiner
of the 5th June 1909 (p. 1) notes:
"A Tasmanian tiger
has been caught on the Middlesex run. It measured 7ft. from tip to
tip".
The Launceston Examiner
of the 22nd November 1887 (p. 2) notes:
"The animal measured
7ft. from the tip of his nose to the end of his tail, and weighed 65½
lb".
The Launceston Examiner
of the 28th May 1887 (p. 2) notes:
"His tigership measured
five feet from tip to tip, and weighed about 60lbs., while his height was
about 2ft. 6in".
The Mercury of the 12th
July 1884 (p. 4) notes:
"Mr. Thos. Dunbabin
has again been fortunate in capturing a tiger upon his sheep run.
The animal is of a large size measuring 5ft. 2½ in. from the tip
of the tail to his head".
The Mercury of the 23rd
July 1892 (p.4) notes:
"A large tiger was
caught last week near Fentonbury, on a run owned by Mr. R. C. Read, of
Redlands, by the shepherd, John McCullum, in a snare which was set for
kangaroo. It is over 4ft. from tip of nose to butt of tail".
Importantly, two of
these press reports also quote the body weights.
Whilst working on the
International Thylacine Specimen Database (ITSD), Dr. Stephen Sleightholme
measured a number of skins and taxidermy specimens in which the sex of
the individual was known. These measurements are published here for
the first time, together with known historical measurements. Sleightholme
(2013) states:
"The measurements of taxidermy specimens and skins can
only be used as an approximate guide to life measurements. Specimen
skins are subject to shrinkage with storage, and by the very nature of
the taxidermy process, skins are stretched over a manikin".
The male group consisted
of a total of 18 animals. Measurements from five of these were taken
from historic records - e.g., Paterson (1805), Harris (1808), Temminck
(1824), Waterhouse (1846), and Cunningham (1882). The remaining thirteen
measurements have been taken from skins, wet specimens, or taxidermy mounts
in the collections of the Australian Museum (AM1) (AM2) (AM3), Cambridge
University Museum of Zoology [UK] (A6 7.2) (A6 7.13), Zoological Museum
in Zurich (11184), National Australian Museum in Canberra (AIA 4330), Whanganui
Regional Museum [NZ] (1805.61), University of Ghent [BEL] (taxidermy),
Museum National d' histoire Naturelle in Paris (2000-153), Booth Museum
[UK] (300130), Otago Museum [NZ] (VT2607) and The Bristol Museum &
Art Gallery [UK] (Aa1637). Measurements were obtained with a tape
measure starting from the nose then following the contour of the midline
of the head and back to the root of the tail. Measurements from historical
records were converted from imperial to metric measurements for accurate
comparison. AM 1-3 are skin measurements taken by Malcolm Smith (1982)
from the Australian Museum collection and noted in his paper: "Review
of the Thylacine". Specimen AIA 4330 in the collection of the
National Museum of Australia is a "wet" specimen. Additionally, the
measurements for three juvenile males: Crisp (1855), Oxford Museum of Natural
History (OU-8091), and the Cambridge Museum of Zoology (A6 7.12), have
been included, plus an adult skin from Cambridge Museum of Zoology with
a withered tail (A6 7.4). These four measurements have been included
for the purpose of comparison, but excluded from calculations to determine
the mean adult body length. |
