The return of the thylacine begins today

twilighter

twilighter

Well-Known Member
10+ year member
"The return of the thylacine begins today. In collaboration with Andrew Pask, Ph.D of the The University of Melbourne, we are restoring an iconic keystone species that played a vital role in regulating Australia’s The return of the thylacine begins today. In collaboration with Andrew Pask, Ph.D of the The University of Melbourne, we are restoring an iconic keystone species that played a vital role in regulating Australia’s ecosystem."

Thylacine
 
:D Lots of flashy graphics for something that probably won't happen, at least for decades. "Rewilding" definitely won't happen. The genetic diversity doesn't exist, the habitat doesn't exist. They would be too popular and famous to be able to exist on their own. Maybe a few in zoos, at best.

I really wish these projects would focus their science and money on keeping the species we have now alive.
 
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twilighter said:
"The return of the thylacine begins today. In collaboration with Andrew Pask, Ph.D of the The University of Melbourne, we are restoring an iconic keystone species that played a vital role in regulating Australia’s The return of the thylacine begins today. In collaboration with Andrew Pask, Ph.D of the The University of Melbourne, we are restoring an iconic keystone species that played a vital role in regulating Australia’s ecosystem."

Thylacine
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It’s a lovely promise, but one we’ve heard so many times before.

I remember hearing about plans to clone this species back when I was a child in the 2000’s and agree with @TinoPup this is probably decades away given the challenges involved.
 
However cool it would be to see a living thylacine rather than museum specimens, personally I feel that funds spent on de-extinction would be much better spent on conserving habitats and species that we still have a chance of saving from extinction.

There are so many urgent environmental challenges that we can ill afford to spend money on frivolities like de-extinction.
 
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I agree with most here in that I wish these projects were better spent on conserving living species and that they might be a bit too optimistic. However, to give the benefit of the doubt... This new project seems to be revolving around genome editing rather than cloning as most have been in the past. This could prove to be a gamechanger but I don't know enough about the technology involved.
 
...today?
All the flashy graphics on the page aside, what major event in the proposed reconstruction of the thylacine has occurred since yesterday? a week ago? a month ago?
And now news sources are again reporting what they did before...
At least, perhaps, within several decades' time, I will have quite the unique piece for the photographic collection..
But was the money on reviving what was gone before well-spent in the shadow of other species going the way of the dodo themselves? Perhaps not..
 
TinoPup said:
the habitat doesn't exist.
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Does it not?

I mean they only went extinct say 40 years ago. Surely the habitat hasn't been able to adept severely enough to not be suitable anymore for the thylacine.

Unless it's all destroyed ofcourse, then it doesn't exist.

However there might still be other suitable habitat around
 
Too many graphics, not enough discussion of how this work will actually help with conservation of extant species, and nothing on what the plan would be after/if it's born. How do they plan on 'rewilding' with an animal who'll have no access to conspecifics from which it could learn how to behave?
 
Ursus said:
Does it not?

I mean they only went extinct say 40 years ago. Surely the habitat hasn't been able to adept severely enough to not be suitable anymore for the thylacine.

Unless it's all destroyed ofcourse, then it doesn't exist.

However there might still be other suitable habitat around
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They went extinct nearly 100 years ago, it just took 46 years for it to be declared as the governing bodies require so many searches, etc before they'll make that official proclamation. The species went extinct because of habitat destruction from European settlers, hunting, and introduced diseases from dogs. In the 1930s, the population of Tasmania was a little over 200,000. Now, it's closer to 550,000. Their habitat was cut down for wood and to create clearings for more homes for all of these people. Additionally, much of the hunting was due to bounties because of the animals killing livestock. Those 350,000 extra people also have plenty more small dogs, cats, and farm animals that they wouldn't want threatened by a new predator (akin to the wolves in the northwest USA, where they still have other predators).
 
twilighter said:
"The return of the thylacine begins today. In collaboration with Andrew Pask, Ph.D of the The University of Melbourne, we are restoring an iconic keystone species that played a vital role in regulating Australia’s The return of the thylacine begins today. In collaboration with Andrew Pask, Ph.D of the The University of Melbourne, we are restoring an iconic keystone species that played a vital role in regulating Australia’s ecosystem."

Thylacine
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I will believe it when I see it! However, I wish you every success.
 
They said this same thing years ago, and it still hasn't happened. I remember a headline saying wooly mammoths could be cloned in two years. Look where that's at now.
 
TinoPup said:
:D Lots of flashy graphics for something that probably won't happen, at least for decades. "Rewilding" definitely won't happen. The genetic diversity doesn't exist, the habitat doesn't exist. They would be too popular and famous to be able to exist on their own. Maybe a few in zoos, at best.

I really wish these projects would focus their science and money on keeping the species we have now alive.
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I think the project is unlikely to work, but I would like it to work. The thylacine is a species that was adapted to its environment and there is a lot of suitable habitat in Tasmania. I'm unsure about which 'closely related animals' would be used, as the thylacine was the only member of its family and had no close relatives.

I agree about science and money being available to help species that exist, but too much of that money is being spent on popular charismatic ABC species and too little on obscure and possibly unpopular species.
 
Pantheraman said:
They said this same thing years ago, and it still hasn't happened. I remember a headline saying wooly mammoths could be cloned in two years. Look where that's at now.
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Elon say he's going to Mars in 10 years, so .……………………

Anyway i do believe its more and more possible with the improvement technology of gene editing.
Dassie rat said:
I think the project is unlikely to work, but I would like it to work. The thylacine is a species that was adapted to its environment and there is a lot of suitable habitat in Tasmania. I'm unsure about which 'closely related animals' would be used, as the thylacine was the only member of its family and had no close relatives.

I agree about science and money being available to help species that exist, but too much of that money is being spent on popular charismatic ABC species and too little on obscure and possibly unpopular species.
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Most likely numbat or tassie devils.
 
I just began reading articles, including the Colossal website, about this proposed venture and it literally sounds like a rich person’s endeavor, plain and simple. So much has changed in the last 100 years around the world, let alone Australia. Like did we not just witness the insane wildfires that ravaged Australia about 2 years ago and millions of acres/animals were lost? Now imagine adding a species, that was extinct and will need a decent population to establish themselves, into the wild with one of their main reasons for extinction is still around(dingo).

Like others have said, it will only exist in captivity and by zoos that have the means and resources to care for a specie we may not know how to care for. I would want to be proven wrong but there are way too many factors to say that re-wilding thylacines, aside from bringing them back, would be successful.

Edit: I did see they plan to add the thylacine population to Tasmania so maybe they won’t competition regarding dingos but it does feel like it’s not without repercussions to the current ecosystem. Again, I would want to be wrong about seeing a thriving population but feel pessimistic :(
 
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If anything, I'd imagine that a neo-thylacine population, if released into the wild would be put to rest fairly quickly by introduced dingos and foxes long before it truly integrated itself...
It would have to be mainly sustained in captive setting = \
 
Dassie rat said:
I think the project is unlikely to work, but I would like it to work. The thylacine is a species that was adapted to its environment and there is a lot of suitable habitat in Tasmania. I'm unsure about which 'closely related animals' would be used, as the thylacine was the only member of its family and had no close relatives.

I agree about science and money being available to help species that exist, but too much of that money is being spent on popular charismatic ABC species and too little on obscure and possibly unpopular species.
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It was adapted to its environment hundreds of years ago. The species was already in big decline before settlers arrived and took over their environment.
 
TinoPup said:
:D Lots of flashy graphics for something that probably won't happen, at least for decades. "Rewilding" definitely won't happen. The genetic diversity doesn't exist, the habitat doesn't exist. They would be too popular and famous to be able to exist on their own. Maybe a few in zoos, at best.

I really wish these projects would focus their science and money on keeping the species we have now alive.
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While obviously massively reduced in comparison to pre-colonialism, there is still a large amount of suitable habitat available for thylacines, with essentially the entire South-West portion of Tasmania being uninhabited. While habitat destruction is believed to have played a role, the thylcaines extinction was largely due to excessive hunting and disease on a population greatly reduced by hunting. On another note there is also a large amount of suitable habitat in Australia and New Guinea, however the presence of dingoes and New Guinea Singing Dogs would likely affect thylcaine populations reintroduced in these areas.
 
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