Black panthers, cougars, even big, hairy apes roaming the Australian bush: that I can handle. But I confess that what I find most perplexing are the reports of thylacines, or Tasmanian tigers on the mainland. The extinction of the thylacine has left an open wound in the Australian psyche. The three species of bandicoots and six species of wallabies which have gone the way of the dodo in historical times have hardly ruffled the public consciousness - let alone all those whose ranges have contracted to tiny enclaves, often on off-shore islands. Indeed, as far as the central hare wallaby is concerned, it is unlikely anyone but a real specialist has taken notice. It is known to science by only a single skull presented in 1932 by the only white man ever to see the living animal.
But when the last official Tasmanian tiger passed on in 1936, the whole nation was aware of the tragedy. The thylacine can be found depicted everywhere in Tasmania: on its coat of arms, on Government department logos, on its beer. Countless expeditions have set out in search of it. Many people still believe it clings to existence. Almost everybody hopes it does. But what is really confusing are the reports which keep cropping up from odd corners of the mainland, where it is supposed to have been extinct for several thousand years. There exists a sort of "thylacine fever" in some areas, and every brindled dingo, mangy fox, or otherwise aberrant carnivore is uncritically labelled a thylacine. By now I refuse to take such claims seriously unless they are very detailed and well documented. The trouble is, some of them are.