or Tasmanian tiger or thylacine
Extinct, slender, fox-faced marsupial ( Thylacinus cynocephalus ,family Thylacinidae), 4050 in.
(100130 cm) long. It was yellowish brown, with dark bars on the back and rump. It hunted at night for wallabies and birds. The female carried her young in a shallow pouch. Once found on the Australian mainland and New Guinea, it was confined to Tasmania in historical times, when competition with the dingo led to its disappearance from the mainland. Europeans in Tasmania hunted it to protect their sheep; the last known individual died in captivity in 1936.