Geography Reference
In-Depth Information
The last such thylacine transaction was valued at £25, sold to Taronga Park,
12 October 1918 (Guiler
1986
).
The thylacine may now be dead but it is not forgotten. It is now the iconic
emblem of many things Tasmanian - from civic sculptures, to restaurants to beer.
Thylacine images adorn a plethora of tourist ephemera, including t-shirts, caps,
badges, mugs, stickers, and key-rings. There is a good selection of soft and cuddly
stuffed-toy thylacines.
The image of a contented thylacine stares out from every Tasmanian vehicle number
plate, and most recently has been coupled with the invitation to readers to: 'Explore
the Possibilities'. Official Tasmanian Government letterhead, brochures and publica-
tions bear a thylacine image. Even government roadside billboards demonizing foxes
and promoting poison-baiting of the island for fox extermination, are emblazoned
with this happy thylacine image, apparently without any sense of incongruity.
The thylacine has by now made a successful transition from being a living part of
the fabric of the island's biota, to iconic branding marker for things genuinely
Tasmanian. Once exterminated, the thylacine went on to become a ubiquitous and
celebrated icon of Tasmania. The irony is apparently lost in the ether that the tourist
trinkets are made in China, and that the thylacine was decried before it was deified.
Unlike the scatter-gun native wildlife poison-bait programs that were to fol-
low, the thylacine bounties, in place from 1830, were precisely targeted environ-
mental management practices with measurable outcomes.
1080
In 1951, the year prior to the introduction of the poison '1080' in Tasmania, the
Tasmanian Forestry Commission, offered the following advice in their
Tree Planters
Guide
: “The planting area should be fenced and netted and cleared of rabbits before
planting starts. If netting is not procurable, the rabbits must be, as nearly as possible
exterminated before planting, and war must be waged against them for the first 3 or
4 years after planting” (TFC
1951
).
World War II brought new weapons into play for environmental management. In
1944 more than 1,000 substances were evaluated at the Patuxent Research Refuge
in Maryland, USA for their chemical warfare potential. Sodium fluoroacetate was
entered as sample 1080-44. It was identified as a chemical of high potential toxicity,
including by the US Chemical Warfare Service. The chemical was classified as
'Secret' under the US Espionage Act, and when it was announced to the public it
was identified only as '1080-44' (Connolly
2004
).
Sodium fluoroacetate is a light and fluffy white powder that is an odourless,
tasteless, water-soluble neurotoxin (IRIS
2004
; Rammell and Fleming
1978
). This
toxin is known under a variety of names, including sodium monofluoroacetate. The
chemical formula is C
2
H
2
FNaO
2
(Worthing
1991
). It is the sodium salt of mono-
fluoroacetic acid (C
2
H
3
FO
2
). It is most commonly known as Compound 1080 or
simply '1080'.
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