Thylacine Genome Sequenced

Except one needs DNA from several, unrelated thylacines, mammoths or whatever to found a long-term, viable population. Given the costs one expects they will do it with just one or two animals for publicity, as part of some high profile project, and not follow up with more so that people can study them first hand.

None of the species suggested for resurrection seems of very much economic worth to man, excepting the boon to local tourism, but especially with predators such as thylos, there would be some economic cost to local folks were they reintroduced for that or another purpose. Which means that from an ecological perspective, instead of rewilding, the species will remain "dead" for most intents and purposes.
 
SealPup said:
Except one needs DNA from several, unrelated thylacines, mammoths or whatever to found a long-term, viable population. Given the costs one expects they will do it with just one or two animals for publicity, as part of some high profile project, and not follow up with more so that people can study them first hand.

None of the species suggested for resurrection seems of very much economic worth to man, excepting the boon to local tourism, but especially with predators such as thylos, there would be some economic cost to local folks were they reintroduced for that or another purpose. Which means that from an ecological perspective, instead of rewilding, the species will remain "dead" for most intents and purposes.
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"Economic worth" does not seem to be a criterion for these resurrection projects. At this point most of it is still science fiction. If mammoths, passenger pigeons, and thylacines make a come back, it will essentially be as zoo animals.
 
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DavidBrown said:
"Economic worth" does not seem to be a criteria for these resurrection projects. At this point most of it is still science fiction. If mammoths, passenger pigeons, and thylacines make a come back, it will essentially be as zoo animals.
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Cloning birds like passenger pigeons might be sci fi, but cloning placentals like Dolly is not. Cloning animals with a uterus can be done right now but thylos have no close relative to act as a surrogate, and raising young marsupial joeys is very risky - or impossible. Attempts with placentals from well known clades will be successful first.
 
@SealPup With current technology, I agree with your points. However, given the pace at which genetic technology continues to develop, I wouldn’t be surprised if in the next few decades we are able to artificially create genetic variation by making changes to single base-pairs, or grow an extinct animal in an artificial womb rather than in a surrogate.

As to the economic value: thylacines are now hypothesized to have focused on smaller prey and their persecution for feeding on livestock was largely misfounded, so I’m not sure they’d have that negative of an economic impact. With tourism money, probably quite the opposite. In any case, I think a lot of people would like to see them come back regardless of the economic value.
 
I'm sure the thylos and devils both took lambs tbh. Any lambs must have been at some risk, same as with similarly sized placental carnivores, and thylos did take poultry as well. Given the 30kg thylo's preference for small prey, they might be compared ecologically to 20kg Simien jackals in Afromontane scrublands, equivalent to mallees on the Australian mainland. Despite their smaller size than the thylacines, they will prey on antelope calves by attacking in small groups, hence my assumption the thylos would have done similarly.

The difference from something like jackals, was that the thylo was an ambush predator, not a specialised runner. Though spotted hyenas do plot close to thylacines in humeral morphology. This perplexes a little, as they seem at least moving toward persuit predation.

Then the marsupial reproductive strategy might actually limit the capacity of marsupials to become cursorial pursuit predators, owing to the obligatory use of the forelimbs by crawling neonates (bandicoots, such as Chaeropus, cirvumvent this by way of gymnastics, gravity and a backward facing pouch). Old ideas about Tasmanian wolves as "inferior" counterparts of placental canids, might then have some truth, if the thylo actually was a dasyuroid attempting to become a running predator, but evolution stalled. At this point one ought to point out neither borhyaenoids nor thylacoleonids, can be described as cursorial, as though metatheres really cannot produce an efficient, quadropedal cursor. If not, then thylacines might be Australia's closest attempt.

Thylos were at least pounce-persuit predators according to European eyewitness accounts, contra their elbow morphology, which places them as ambush predators. And the skull shape really is more suggestive of canids than of the grappling cats. The only living analog I can think of is the Simien jackal.
 
SealPup said:
I'm sure the thylos and devils both took lambs tbh. Any lambs must have been at some risk, same as with similarly sized placental carnivores, and thylos did take poultry as well. Given the 30kg thylo's preference for small prey, they might be compared ecologically to 20kg Simien jackals in Afromontane scrublands, equivalent to mallees on the Australian mainland. Despite their smaller size than the thylacines, they will prey on antelope calves by attacking in small groups, hence my assumption the thylos would have done similarly.

The difference from something like jackals, was that the thylo was an ambush predator, not a specialised runner. Though spotted hyenas do plot close to thylacines in humeral morphology. This perplexes a little, as they seem at least moving toward persuit predation.

Then the marsupial reproductive strategy might actually limit the capacity of marsupials to become cursorial pursuit predators, owing to the obligatory use of the forelimbs by crawling neonates (bandicoots, such as Chaeropus, cirvumvent this by way of gymnastics, gravity and a backward facing pouch). Old ideas about Tasmanian wolves as "inferior" counterparts of placental canids, might then have some truth, if the thylo actually was a dasyuroid attempting to become a running predator, but evolution stalled. At this point one ought to point out neither borhyaenoids nor thylacoleonids, can be described as cursorial, as though metatheres really cannot produce an efficient, quadropedal cursor. If not, then thylacines might be Australia's closest attempt.

Thylos were at least pounce-persuit predators according to European eyewitness accounts, contra their elbow morphology, which places them as ambush predators. And the skull shape really is more suggestive of canids than of the grappling cats. The only living analog I can think of is the Simien jackal.
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Except for the fact that Ethiopian wolves diet consists for about 96% of rodents and that in 1800 observation hours a staggering 2 attacks on sheep and goat were noted by researchers, as is summarized in Mammals of Africa...

It would help if you could back up your ideas with actual evidence instead of just making wishful hypotheses...
 
lintworm said:
Except for the fact that Ethiopian wolves diet consists for about 96% of rodents and that in 1800 observation hours a staggering 2 attacks on sheep and goat were noted by researchers, as is summarized in Mammals of Africa...

It would help if you could back up your ideas with actual evidence instead of just making wishful hypotheses...
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And I wish you would note, preference for atypically small prey items is the point of similarity between thylos and simiens, as the former are estimated to prefer proportionlly small prey of 5kg or under, which before Europeans would have constituted birds and marsupials. But yes, simiens do attack ruminant calves, and there is no reason to think thylos would turn down the meal either.

I also notice you arbitrarily mention only attacks by simiens on domestic lambs, and not calves of mountain nyalas, which is at least as relevant to estimating thylacine predation upon livestock. Perhaps you are pulling the conservationist's canard of framing predators in the least harmful terms imaginable, rather than what they can and could do, given opportunity. (And most large carnivores can be adaptable as regards atypical prey, at least when under abnormal stresses.) When a new food source like lambs appears in an animal's range, it will not take advantage of changed circumstances? Just enough to give themselves a bad rep among farmers? Yea right.
 
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SealPup said:
Cloning animals with a uterus can be done right now but thylos have no close relative to act as a surrogate, and raising young marsupial joeys is very risky - or impossible. Attempts with placentals from well known clades will be successful first.
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There are no mammoth uteruses left. Or wooly rhinos. Or whatever extinct placentals people want to bring back. Cloning extinct species is not the same as cloning sheep or other living animals. Can Asian elephants be surrogate uteruses for mammoths? Even that is not clear.
 
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SealPup said:
And I wish you would note, preference for atypically small prey items is the point of similarity between thylos and simiens, as the former are estimated to prefer proportionlly small prey of 5kg or under, which before Europeans would have constituted birds and marsupials. But yes, simiens do attack ruminant calves, and there is no reason to think thylos would turn down the meal either.

I also notice you arbitrarily mention only attacks by simiens on domestic lambs, and not calves of mountain nyalas, which is at least as relevant to estimating thylacine predation upon livestock. Perhaps you are pulling the conservationist's canard of framing predators in the least harmful terms imaginable, rather than what they can and could do, given opportunity. (And most large carnivores can be adaptable as regards atypical prey, at least when under abnormal stresses.) When a new food source like lambs appears in an animal's range, it will not take advantage of changed circumstances? Just enough to give themselves a bad rep among farmers? Yea right.
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Please stop putting words in my mouth that I did not say. As mentioned earlier, rodents consist for 96% of diet, apart from rodents they also feed on carrion, hyraxes, gooslings (and eggs) and yes the occasional nyala infant or common duiker. But these are such insignificant portions of their diet that using Ethiopian wolves as an example of what thylacines could have done is pretty irrelevant when it comes to saying what a good example they are...
 
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DavidBrown said:
There are no mammoth uteruses left. Or wooly rhinos. Or whatever extinct placentals people want bring back. Cloning extinct species is not the same as cloning sheep or other living animals. Can Asian elephants be surrogate uteruses for mammoths? Even that is not clear.
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At least modern elephants are a candidate though, even if you need medical trickery to continue the pregnancy: there is no such living relative for a thylo. Nearest in size and habits and presumably milk composition, is the devil, which is from a different family and success must be much less probable.
 
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