ANALYSES OF VIDEO ALLEGING TO SHOW A THYLACINE IN MAITLAND - SOUTH AUSTRALIA

On July 5th, 2017, you-tuber Paul Day uploaded a video to his channel "AuthorPaulGDay" titled "Could This Be A Tasmanian Tiger".

While out filming a sunrise, Paul captured an animal running across a field, at first he just thought it was a fox or dog, but later thought he may have captured rare footage of a thylacine.

It is easy to see why one would ponder this theory, the animal appears to have an unusual gait, a skipping motion not too dissimilar to the gait attributed to the thylacine, an animal that is officially presumed extinct.

Unfortunately, due to copyright reasons, my enhancement of the video can not be added to this blog, however I can provide a link to Paul's original video HERE

For my own private research, I ran this footage through video editing software. Through this process I was able to zoom in on the animal, and make the view angle follow the animal across the field, at a zoom level which allowed a good understanding of how this animal was using its limbs. This observation was made easier by being able to slow the footage down considerably.

Before jumping to a conclusion that it was a thylacine, which was very tempting given the unusual gait (I was nearly convinced it could be), I had too rule out other possibilities. The most plausible explanation, given that the thylacine is thought to have been extinct on the mainland for at least 2000 years, was that the animal was a canidae with some kind of disability. The canidae family includes foxes and dogs

This list of disabilities was worked through until I came upon the condition of Hip Dysplasia, this condition is particularly prevalent in German Shepherds, an animal very similar in build to the animal in the video.

Firstly, let's analyse the gait attributed to a thylacine when running, an animation showing this gait can be seen HERE on the naturalworlds website. You will see that a thylacine uses its back legs in unison to spring into a leap, landing on its front legs, which work almost in unison to pull it forward until the back legs are in position to propel it forward again, this is similar to other quadrupedic marsupials.

However on close examination the animal in Paul's video does not use its limbs in unison, rather its gait matches a canidae suffering from Hip Dysplasia. View a German Shepherd with Hip Dysplasia running in this video HERE from youtube.

Like the dog in the afore mentioned video, you will see that the animal in Paul's video is not using its front legs in unison, it lands on one and then follows with the other. The front legs can appear shorter than the rear, due to the fact the animal is placing most of its wait on the front legs to minimise the pain in its hip.

More telling is the way the animal is using its rear legs. The animal is holding the limb connected to the affected hip off the ground completely, forcing it to spring off the un-affected leg, this is what appears to make the gait look similar to a thylacine, especially when viewing without sufficient magnification.

In fact the gait of the animal is typical of a dog with Hip Dysplasia at a full run. Another observation of note is that the ears appear to flop up and down, this is not fitting with the short stiff ears of a thylacine.

While I hold out hope that a population of thylacines is hiding out in a remote part of Tasmania, maybe even Mainland Australian or New Guinea, I believe that the animal in Paul's video is far more likely to be a canidae suffering from Hip Dysplasia, especially given the above mentioned observations.

POST SCRIPT

I am receiving some great feedback on this analyses, it is clear that this theory does not put the issue of this animal's identity to rest.

Paul Day has made the good point that the animation linked above is only an educated guess at how the Thylacine ran. He commented that "Early descriptions of the Thylacine stated that it ran with an unusual, irregular, even clumsy gait".

This footage HERE of a quoll running has been bought to my attention, which shows this distantly related marsupial using its front legs in a very similar way to the animal in Paul's video. 

Interestingly, in 1973 an animal was filmed in South Australia which could possibly show a thylacine (The Doyle Footage). It has a gait matching exactly to the gait suggested in the animation on Natural World's website (linked above), an animation that is based on a lot of research. If we take the Doyle footage to be a Thylacine, that would make the animation a near perfect demonstration of how the thylacine ran in the wild. The jury is out on whether the Doyle footage is a thylacine. You can see the Doyle footage HERE. The gait is markedly different to that of the animal in Paul's video.

The mystery continues...

AN ALLEGED THYLACINE PHOTOGRAPH FROM 2008 - ANALYSIS & COMPARISON TO A MUSEUM SPECIMEN

In late 2016 an image depicting an animal was released by its author, who claimed it was a thylacine, or Tasmanian Tiger, a presumed extinct top level marsupial predator. The author of the photograph, who wished only to be known as Andrew, lives in North East Tasmania and it is in this region the animal was photographed on one of his game trail cameras on the 31st of march 2008.

Along with the photograph Andrew gave an interview, on the podcast "Tasmania Talks". In the interview Andrew made the following claims in regards to the photo:

• It's walking with one foot forward and one foot back so it's not a kangaroo or wallaby.
• It's walking, not hopping.
• It has left a round flat footprint in the sand which does not match the long thin footprint of a macropod (the hopping marsupials).
• The flat top of the animal is indicative of it being a thylacine.
• Three stripes are visible just above where the tail joins the body.

It is true the left foot is forward of the right, however this is only by a few inches, the feet of a macropod don't always land exactly together, especially when the animal is turning, as evidenced in this still from a video taken of a wallaby initiating a turn while in motion.

As far as the alleged foot print, there are many depressions in the sand all around the animal. We can not automatically draw a conclusion that one particular large depression behind the animal is in fact its foot print, and then discern the shape of its foot from it. The low angle of the photograph does not allow any detailed analyses of the depression in question, certainly not to the point in which any particular specie can be ruled in or out for creating it.

If the animal were a thylacine it would be in a similar position to the thylacine pictured here at the old Hobart Zoo, with its front lowered the front legs are splayed out. Splayed out front legs are not visible on Andrew's animal, when they should be when photographed at such an angle. This suggests Andrew's animal has the shorter stumpier "arms" of a macropod.

There are a lack of clear photographs online showing a thylacine from directly behind. Generally people take photographs of animals from the side or "face on". I therefore took my own photographs of a taxidermied thylacine in the Hobart museum, in order to discern the shape of a thylacine's back and the nature of its stripes when viewed directly from behind.

This first photograph is taken looking down on a similar angle to the animal in Andrew's photograph. If the museum thylacine's head were lowered, the top of the back would appear flat due to the ridge of the thylacine's shoulders. The stripes on the thylacine arc right around, almost forming a circle around the posterior. There do appear to be some dark bands evident in Andrew's photograph, however they lack the distinction of the stripes in this or any other museum specimen, and due to the blurry nature of the photograph they are not conclusive.

Another feature that is clearly evident in Andrew's photograph is the heel pad on the animals hock, which enables a clear comparison to be made with the museum specimen. What is obvious is that Andrew's animal lacks the curved upper extension to the heel pad that the thylacine has. For me this clearly rules the animal out as a thylacine candidate.

When compared to a photo of a pademelon the heel pad of the animal in question makes a comfortable match.

If the above pademelon were leaning further forward with it's head down, and its tail stretched out to counter balance, it would be a very close match to Andrew's photograph, it even appears to have one foot slightly forward of the other.

Here is a close up comparison of the museum thylacine's heel pad [LEFT], with its curved upper section branching off on the top left, verse the heel pad on Andrew's animal [RIGHT], which despite being blurry at this zoom level the upper half of the heel pad is clearly visible.

I don't think Andrew's animal is a wallaby as it lacks the dark tip on its tail, also a wallaby's back is considerably rounder.

Another point to make is the thylacine has very short close cropped hair, this really struck me viewing the animal up close in person at the museum. Andrew's animal is clearly quite "woolly" as evidenced by its outline.

The claim the animal is walking and not a hopper does not stack up, what we see are the two raised ankle pads on the hocks of a macropod as it launches itself forward. I believe the animal in Andrew's photograph to be a pademelon (Thylogale billardierii). The hunched nature of the animal better matches a pademelon than a wallaby, in fact the pademelon, although a biped, often takes a quadruped like stance as evidenced in this photograph, also note the flattish upper back.

This pademelon is in a virtually identical stance to the one in Andrew's photograph. Looking through the back legs of Andrew's animal you can see the front legs. The nature of a two dimensional photograph makes it hard to discern the front and back legs from each other when photographed from behind, if it were a thylacine they would be more apparent, being splayed outward when the animal is crouched.

Andrew makes many other claims in his interview on "Tasmania Talks", plus in an earlier call to ABC talk back radio. These claims involve having seen 5 thylacines with his own eyes, having 40 much clearer photos from his game trail cameras (which he will not release) and having captured two thylacines, one in 1952 and another in 1974. He also claims to have inside knowledge of a government cover-up regarding the thylacine. Whether these claims add or subtract to the credibility of his claims regarding the photograph discussed here I leave to the reader's judgement.

I'm not closed to the idea that there may be a remnant population of thylacines hiding out in the remote wilderness of Tasmania, and I'm fascinated by the evidence that comes to light from time to time, it is that fascination that inspired my analyses of this photograph, the purpose is not to ridicule those who are adamant it contains a thylacine. I welcome healthy debate on the matter.

Here are some more photographs I took of the Thylacine at the Hobart Museum (TMAG). The thylacine was captured by bushmen Paddy Hartnett in the Florentine Valley and sold to the museum in 1926. It was then taxidermied by Miss Allison Reid.

And the rear of a skin: