Chapter 15

The Sightings Continue

During one of my thylacine lectures at Mount Field National Park, I happened to mention the fact we never hear of a thylacine being knocked down on the roads, despite almost every other species being seen squashed on the bitumen. Following question time, I was approached by a young couple, Bob and Ann, who shared a most fascinating story. In the summer of 1989 they had arrived in Tasmania from the UK on a cycling holiday. During the course of their travels, they left St Marys early one morning to cycle down towards the coast. The road they travelled continually twists and turns as it winds its way on a steep, downhill route through the Elephant Pass before joining the East Coast Road. As they negotiated a steep hairpin bend near the Elephant Pass, they came upon a road kill. It was not unexpected, and only one of many they would encounter on their long journey south, but there was something distinctly different about this particular animal. Having been run down the previous night, the carcass was still reasonably fresh, although now suffering considerable damage from passing traffic. The remains of this dog-sized animal clearly displayed dark stripes on a sandy brown body with a kangaroo-like tail. The front half, including the head, had been obliterated almost beyond recognition, while the rear portion was still relatively intact.

It had been killed on a section of road where no vehicle could safely stop, and therefore it was highly unlikely that a car or truck would have been able to slow down sufficiently to give the driver a clear look at the remains while negotiating the dangerous corner. Because they were on pushbikes, Bob and Anne were able to pause momentarily to quickly inspect the remains. They noted it was quite unlike any animal they had previously seen dead on the many roads they had by then travelled. It didn’t enter their heads to take a photo considering the imminent danger they faced stopping there. With their brief inspection completed, they continued on with their journey towards the coast. On reaching Hobart several days later, they made a point of visiting the museum in an attempt to discover the identity of the strange road kill. It wasn’t long before they came across the thylacine display, immediately recognising it as being the animal they had seen squashed on the road. Approaching an attendant, they shared with him details of their exciting discovery.

‘There’s none of those things left nowadays,’ he sneered. ‘They all died out years ago. It must have been a wallaby you saw squashed on the road. It couldn’t have possibly been a thylacine. Are you sure you weren’t suffering a hangover from the night before?’

They assured me that after that rebuke they never told another soul; that is until they heard me mention the situation regarding road kills. They were in their early 30s, a respectable and well-spoken young couple, and I had no reason to disbelieve their intriguing story. Having over the years heard numerous such stories, this was by far the most credible.

It was around this time that I received the sad news that my good friend Eric Guiler had suffered a severe stroke while conducting a field exercise investigating thylacine activity in the Arthur River area of the north-west. A local tourism operator had alerted Guiler to a sound sighting in wilderness country along the river. Together they had investigated the locality, walking through thick bush to higher ground from where they could survey the surrounding terrain. It was following this demanding bushwalk that Eric was taken seriously ill. I afterwards contacted the tourism operator who told me of hearing high-pitched coughing noises coming from the bush in an isolated area situated about 20 kilometres from the junction of the Salmon and Arthur Rivers, the scene of Hans Naarding’s much celebrated 1982 thylacine sighting. The unusual noise came from along the banks of a small creek that runs into the Arthur River. I have long considered this area to be prime thylacine habitat, as have many other researchers, with many useful sightings coming from the Arthur-Pieman Conservation Region over the past 50 years.

A pleasure craft operator told of an incident some weeks previously when a wallaby suddenly burst from the bush in blind panic, startling a party of tourists he was leading on a bushwalk. He made special mention of a strange pungent odour lingering in a dry creek bed along the river, as well as finding the partly eaten carcass of a wallaby and a tiger cat.

He also spoke of another incident further along the coast near Couta Rocks, where a grader operator was working along a gravel road early one morning when he observed a strange animal crossing the track. This is an extremely isolated locality near the once-busy seaport of Temma; from here entry was gained to the frontier boom town of Balfour, scene of a copper mining rush in the early 1900s.

At this point, I would like to relate relevant information from my personal research in this particular area of north-western Tasmania.

Over the period I spent interviewing Reg Trigg in the early 1980s, I managed to glean a host of fascinating stories concerning various Tasmanian bushmen who were linked in some way to the Tasmanian tiger. During the course of these conversations, Reg made particular mention of certain of these old-timers, all unique characters in their own right, many of whom no doubt influenced his colourful storytelling ability. Mark Blake was one such bushman, and the Smithton identity could spin endless yarns about the Tasmanian tiger, being particularly well-known locally for his absorbing and colourful repertoire. He, like so many others from northern Tasmania, referred to the tiger as a hyena.

There were also many other well-known north-west coast bushmen from that same era: Paddy Keenan, Fred Emmerton and Alf Sharman, all reputed to have killed or captured Tasmanian tigers during the early 1900s, and each with fascinating tales to tell.

Reg also made mention of a grand old bushman named Mark McLeod, who roamed far and wide throughout Tasmania during his long and eventful life before eventually finishing up at the abandoned mining town of Balfour during the 1940s. Although he chose to live out his twilight years in isolation that almost defied description, McLeod was always thankful for an unexpected visit from a passing traveller.

Balfour hosted a shallow copper field that went through boom and bust in just a few short years from 1910–12. Around 1907, the famed Tasmanian explorer-cum-prospector TB Moore pegged numerous claims in the area and in doing so laid the foundations for the future copper field. During its brief heyday, Balfour is believed to have had a population of almost one thousand souls, and could boast two hotels, a general store and numerous other commercial enterprises. The only way into the town was via a 22-mile pack track through rainforest from the Arthur River, followed by a 16-mile tramline journey through the bush from the coastal port of Temma. It sounded strikingly similar to the Adams River osmiridium saga of the 1920s.

A typhoid epidemic ravaged the settlement in 1912, and the fact that there was no hospital or resident doctor spelt tragedy for the inhabitants. Adding to their woes were extremely poor sanitation and a bacteria-ridden town butchery. As a result, Balfour, which had previously displayed an air of permanence, was virtually wiped off the map overnight. By the 1940s, all that remained were a few derelict shanties, a number of old tombstones and several crumbling ruins. Today there is even less to gaze upon as the bush has all but reclaimed this once proud township.

Reg Trigg dropped in on Mark McLeod in 1947 shortly before returning to Victoria, spending an interesting few weeks with the elderly gent who was then almost 80 years of age. McLeod, once a tall, strong and active man, was now bent and twisted with age and ravaged by severe arthritis. Although his clothing bore patches upon patches, this didn’t seem to bother the old gent, as the delight of human company was for him a rare luxury. McLeod had a liking for hard liquor, his meagre supply no doubt sustained by the generosity of infrequent callers to the ramshackle abode he called home. At his time of life, his main ambition was to keep the home fires burning in order to ward off the harsh Balfour weather; his days were spent gathering firewood and snaring game for his next meal. The elderly hermit had the ability to hold his audience spellbound for hours, providing his glass was kept topped with spirits, with much of his superb storytelling invariably laced with anecdotes of the Tasmanian tiger.

McLeod was emphatic that tigers still stalked the deserted streets of the old mining town after dark. This in itself was enough to unnerve many a visitor unfamiliar with the nocturnal habits of the legendary marsupial carnivore. As if to back up McLeod’s claim, Reg swore he heard the unmistakable cries of hunting tigers plying the nearby hills during his two-week stay. Coming as they did in the wee morning hours, Reg told me he would lie awake, listening warily to the nocturnal activity, happy in the knowledge that the tiger may still exist. His elderly host openly admitted to seeing a number of live tigers in his time, including a few around Balfour, and claimed to have often found their tracks in the earth surrounding his snare lines. Before Reg departed, the old chap led him to a nearby section of country to prove his point. And sure enough, there in the damp loam were the unmistakable prints of not one, but two adult tigers complete with smaller prints, giving hope that these animals were still breeding in the area.

***

At the end of February 2002, Jackie O’Toole, the producer of the ABC’s Dimensions program, arrived with presenter Melissa Cunningham and her film crew to do a segment on my search for the tiger. After the customary morning tea, I took them out along the Junee River, where they filmed for several hours at various spots. The resulting program was most entertaining.

Shortly after I was contacted by Deb Aklin, Senior Broadcast Producer for National Geographic USA, requesting an interview for a five-minute segment on a program called Stories from Around the World, a show that reached five million homes in the US and Canada. She said they would be arriving towards the end of March.

The following week Lothar Frenz arrived from Germany with a film crew to produce a documentary on the thylacine. I took them to Adamsfield, where they shot various sequences along the Adams River. They had already interviewed several tiger enthusiasts in the north and still had several other interviews to conduct. I tried to impress on Mr Frenz the importance of real life dramas centred on actual historical facts concerning the thylacine. ‘This is certainly the way I would go with any documentary dealing with the thylacine,’ I assured him. It appears he took my advice to heart, because the completed 30-minute documentary contained several superb historical re-creations. One skilfully performed sequence featured Wilf Batty’s 1930 shooting of, reputedly, the last tiger to be killed in the wild.

Towards the end of March 2002, the National Geographic crew arrived at Maydena, comprising producer Deb Aklin and camera and sound man Charles McDonald. I took them out to Adamsfield, where they filmed and interviewed me during a lengthy bushwalk. They were most professional, and I thoroughly enjoyed working with them.

Shortly after, I received an email from US adventurer Bill Cacciolfi from Ohio. Bill was interested in conducting a Tasmanian photographic expedition the following November and requested my help in directing him to various scenic spots along the east coast.

At the invitation of National Parks and Wildlife Service officer Nick Mooney, I visited the NPWS office in June 2002 to search through their thylacine files, and spent three hours fossicking through a mountain of fascinating material. While some reports were worthy of further investigation, others were hardly worth the paper they are written on. That said, there was much of value to be found, if only from an historical perspective, and that, after all, was my main motive. I asked Mooney what was the best course of action should one find a dead thylacine in the bush. He advised that the NPWS directs that you do not interfere with or remove the carcass; that the wisest thing would be to extensively photograph it for proof, and then hand the cadaver over to the authorities. However politically correct this may be, there would be little point in leaving such valuable evidence on the ground to be cleaned up the following night by marauding carnivores.

Within the thylacine files, there are official warnings from the NPWS strongly advising the public not to try trapping tigers in response to Ted Turner’s offer of a $100,000 reward in 1984, an inducement that has since been rescinded. Leading Victorian thylacine researcher Murray McAllister received official word from Turner several years ago that he was no longer offering the reward. McAllister had been keen to claim the money, conducting numerous searches for the Tasmanian tiger in south Gippsland following reputed sightings in recent years.

One hopeful tiger hunter brazenly expressed his aspirations in correspondence to the Premier, Robin Gray, who wrote back a stern letter warning him against attempting to trap a tiger. Another prominent tiger hunter sought permission to trap a thylacine. Subsequently, he was warned against this practice at risk of prosecution. Regardless, later correspondence revealed he defied officialdom and continued his trapping program. His defiance of authority eventually brought about his undoing and he was taken to court and prosecuted.

Another interesting report told of a timber worker having located a tiger’s lair deep in the south-west. He claimed to have collected some 20 carnivore scats from an isolated rock overhang. A forestry inspector was sent to investigate, but there the file went cold, as is so often the case.

Several well-known thylacine enthusiasts had, over the years, continued to bombard the NPWS with loads of trivial correspondence, sometimes to the point of becoming downright nuisances. To their credit, the department remained tolerant of all this monkey business, ever genial with its response.

Surprisingly, there were numerous big cat sightings filed, mainly from southern Tasmania and the Central Highlands. One frustrated farmer claimed he was being forced out of grazing by predatory thylacines ravaging his flocks — not 100 years ago as one might imagine, but in the 1990s! He pleaded in vain for action on the matter, but NPWS was adamant that the perpetrators were not thylacines but domestic dogs. This was also the case around 100 years ago when thylacines were here in good numbers; then, as now, they were being roundly blamed for the actions of wild dogs.

One particular thylacine enthusiast, apparently not satisfied with his five minutes of fame at seeing his name in the newspapers, kept up his one-man crusade for a full-scale tiger search for many years, lobbying everyone from the premier and various politicians to museum staff. His constant barrage of correspondence appears, not surprisingly, to have fallen on deaf ears.

Several interstate serial pests persisted with their pleas that there were thylacines running rampant on mainland Australia. Once again, to their credit, NPWS remained gracious in their responses to these people.

It was a most intriguing exercise and one that opened my eyes to the lengths some people will go to in an effort to make their point. The almost continual flow of public correspondence from all sections of the community gives some idea of the huge amount of community interest there is in the Tasmanian tiger.

***

Following a report of a thylacine sighting from the Central Plateau during July 2002, I visited a property near Waddamana. Reaching this isolated highlands property necessitated travelling through several locked gates and over extremely rough dirt roads. This undulating, rock-strewn country is lacking nutrients, judg­ing by the meagre coverage of grass. Despite this, there were cattle grazing in many areas and numerous forms of wildlife. An interview with farmer Greg at the location of his sighting produced the following report:

‘This night I was driving back from town. It was in the early hours of the morning. I remember saying to my wife that it was strange there were no animals around as we drove down to the creek. There’s usually a wallaby or two that come hopping from the top of the bank across the road because there’s a big marsh just through the trees there.

‘What happens is that when you come though here in the late afternoon or early morning, the wallaby are either coming down off the top of the hill or going back again, and there wasn’t even a possum that morning — not a thing.

‘I was coming down the bank there, and I said to my wife, it’s a funny thing there’s nothing around tonight, and when I neared the bottom over the creek there [pointing to the spot], this animal came up just over there a bit, and I thought, hell, what’s that, and why is it coming up out of there?

‘I swung the vehicle around and caught him in the headlights as he was going down across here. Now at the time, there was absolutely no water at all in the creek — the only thing was that little waterhole over there. It was so dry that we were carting water in at night from the lagoon.

‘My daughter-in-law also saw a tiger further along in the fork of the road.’

I asked, ‘Are you sure it was a tiger?’

‘Yes, I couldn’t believe my eyes — I said, “hell, what’s that?” when I first seen it.’

‘Do you reckon it was full grown?’

‘Yes, it was definitely full grown, but I don’t know whether it was male or female. It was back in May this year. The deer some­times come down though there as well.’

I asked, ‘Did you see any stripes?’

‘Yes, we did. My wife swears she saw one on the Tier over there a few years ago, just on the top of that hill you can see over there.’

Following the interview, Greg drove me over rough bush tracks to show me the lie of the land, pointing out various landmarks as we travelled. Explaining that it was all prime deer shooting country, he wondered if hunters had seen tigers and not spoken about it. At that time the place was literally swarming with Tasmanian devils, but there was no evidence of the terrible facial tumour disease that was to decimate these populations over the coming years. The property covered several thousand acres and varied greatly in terrain, from swampy lowland through to tangled eucalypt scrub and large rocky outcrops.

This particular area of the Central Plateau is a hunter’s paradise; deer and wallaby shooters regularly scour the countryside for game. I was cautioned to stay well away during the deer season that runs the whole month of March each year. There were also deer poachers to contend with, and these insurgents are not governed by seasonal restrictions or moral codes. This in itself was a disturbing factor for the future welfare of any thylacine that may be regularly traversing the area.

While scouting the rough, rocky terrain, I found numerous shooters’ hides, both on the ground and in trees, and also signs of campfires hunters had used during their search for feral deer. During my reconnaissance of the area, I saw only one deer, despite there being a fairly large population throughout the Tier. I reckoned that if they were so hard to find, then so too would be any transient tiger. This region is the home range of a hunting club that I was assured zealously guarded the area.

On Tuesday 5 November 2002, the cryptozoology team from Ohio, led by Bill Cacciolfi and Mark Miller, arrived at Hobart Airport. Miller and Cacciolfi had been partners in many hair-raising adventures. These seasoned expeditioners were now turning their attention to Tasmania and the thylacine. Early next morning I led them deep into the south-west to show them exactly what Tasmania had to offer in the way of thylacine habitat. We spent time viewing button grass flats and rocky escarpments, rivers, creeks and mountain terrain; highland areas rich in thylacine history, and by the end of that first day I believed they were suitably impressed by the diversity of scenery and the ruggedness of the topography.

The next day, with inclement weather curtailing our plans somewhat, we marked time by taking in spots of interest around Hobart; the Museum and the Antarctic display, Cascade Brewery and various other venues. A visit to Nick Mooney at NPWS headquarters enlightened Cacciolfi and his crew to the complexities of searching for the thylacine.

Over the following days, I led the party up the east coast, visiting the various nature parks, before driving to Cape Portland via Musselroe Bay and Rushy Lagoon. This vast swathe of countryside has seen many quality thylacine sightings over the years, before and after 1936, and had also been the focus of several prominent searches. This gave the party further insight into the huge variety of scenery and native fauna and flora to be found off the beaten track.

Driving to St Marys, we took in the magnificent mountain scenery around Elephant Pass, before winding our way slowly back to the coast again. The team were delighted with the wide variety of native wildlife but somewhat disappointed at not seeing a Tasmanian tiger. The following day we visited Pyengana and the famous St Columba Falls, scene of a much-publicised 1995 tiger sighting. On our way back, we dropped in at the Pub in the Paddock Hotel, a rather famous drinking hole made even more so by the recent well-publicised tiger sighting. We then investigated further along the coast, passing through Binalong Bay and taking in The Gardens and the magnificent Bay of Fires. Moving on to Ansons Bay, we paused to walk a range of dirt tracks where various tiger sightings had occurred over the years. While one party member continued his search for tiger snakes, the camera addicts were kept busy photographing the captivating countryside. They were all suitably impressed by the magnificent sandy beaches that go for miles in either direction, flanked by towering sand dunes and azure-blue seas that only add to the enchantment of this place. When I farewelled the party several days later at the Wrest Point Casino, they assured me they would be back again to mount a thylacine expedition. They have yet to return.

***

Driving through the Sideling I had told the adventurers of the numerous tiger sightings that had surfaced from this region over many years. The 1991 sighting by Scottsdale taxi driver Tony Jarvis made front-page news around the nation.

The Jarvis sighting brought an immediate response from the NPWS who promptly organised a search of the general area. Jarvis remained reluctant to divulge the exact location of his sighting to NPWS officers, fearing the area would be swamped by would-be hunters. NPWS officer Nick Mooney was apprehensive, claiming to have sifted through mountains of material over the years and was yet to be presented with a genuine specimen, dead or alive. Mooney said that despite the folklore surrounding the Tasmanian tiger, it was not an unusual or bizarre animal.

‘In fact, it was fairly normal, but lately it has become mythical,’ he said. ‘If you haven’t got tracks, you haven’t got a tiger.’ He commented that the area of Jarvis’s sighting was better than usual for tracking and likely to show regular movements of animals.

***

Another notable sighting was alleged to have occurred near Pyengana in January 1995, when NPWS Summer Ranger Charlie Beasley claimed to have spotted a Tasmanian tiger near St Columba Falls. The newspapers as usual were the first to hear.

‘It had a curved tail in the same way as a kangaroo does, I have no doubt it was a thylacine,’ Beasley said.

Although the sighting took place in an area of dry sclerophyll forest, the type of country entirely conducive to thylacine habitat, subsequent heavy rain ruined any hope of collecting evidence such as footprints or droppings. Nick Mooney quickly threw a veil of secrecy over the sighting, admitting that, ‘In this rain, we can’t even see the spot where the animal was, but it won’t wash away any evidence of a den. If this is a young transient animal, it will be extremely hard to track, because it could be operating in an area of 50 square kilometres.’

Mooney was quick to point out that, if conclusive evidence of thylacine activity arose, there was no possibility that logging of the area would be interrupted, as he did not consider it harmful to the tiger’s continued existence.

Caught up in the hype was a north-west mechanic and pilot, Roxley Chambers, who stated he was desperate to prove the thylacine still existed in Tasmania. Encouraged by Charlie Beasley’s sighting, Chambers claimed to have recently completed an extensive aerial photographic survey of the region. Now he planned to camp out in the bush for five days at a time until he had the evidence on film. Chambers’s interest in Tasmanian tigers began when he believed he saw one near Forth in 1990. He and a friend watched what they believed was a thylacine cross a road only 15 metres away. Although the sighting lasted only a few seconds, it was enough to propel him into actively searching for the animal. Chambers concentrated his search between Pyengana, Mathinna and Ringarooma. Living on army rations and clad in camouflage clothing, a video camera slung permanently around his neck, he watched and waited for the elusive tiger to stroll out of the bush and surprise him. It failed to do so. All went quiet, and it appeared both his search and the NPWS investigation had proven unsuccessful.

***

In January 2003, I heard that a fox had been sighted close to Maydena and the Fox Free Tasmania Taskforce had been to investigate the report. Shortly after, I received news of another fox sighting near the toll gate, then located on the Gordon River Road just south of Maydena. An investigation of the area revealed nothing of interest.

The fox saga in Tasmania is ongoing, having now been active for the past 14 years since a fox reportedly jumped ship at the Burnie wharf after emigrating from Port Melbourne. Foxes were also suspected of having been illegally smuggled into the state. In 1997 it is believed that eight juvenile foxes entered via the boot of a car travelling on the ferry the Spirit of Tasmania and were released in various areas of northern and eastern Tasmania. That attempt is thought to have failed, resulting in a second introduction of 11 fox cubs in 1999. It was alleged that after being raised to two months of age on a property near Longford, they were then split up and released into various county areas. However, subsequent inquiries by authorities have failed to verify these allegations and they are deemed to be false. Despite this, the question remains: are there foxes in Tasmania today?

The fox chronicle continues unabated, with a concentrated baiting program active in many parts of the island. As the situation stands at present, the general public seem far from convinced. If there are foxes breeding in Tasmania today, then they are masters at remaining out of sight. I personally am not entering into this debate, but I will say this: if on the one hand the Tasmanian Government is content to spend many millions of dollars on the eradication of an animal that seemingly cannot be found, how then can they disregard continued thylacine sightings from various areas of the state without taking action to resolve this question once and for all?

Thylacines are, after all, extremely proficient at remaining out of sight. I have long been reluctant to share critical information with government bodies for fear of overbearing bureaucratic bungling, for I am yet to be convinced that this is the way to go. In the past there have been those who have sought to protect the Tasmanian tiger, should it be found. I have no doubt that there are still those — both within and outside the government — who have the best interests of the animal at heart and would seek to bring about a rescue and protection program aimed at bringing it back from the brink of extinction. If I were to make the breakthrough, then I would expect to be part of any future planning. Despite having no scientific credentials, I believe I have as much of an understanding of the thylacine in the field as any person alive today.

***

Following numerous emails from New York–based authors Michael Crewdson and Margaret Mittelbach and artist Alexis Rockman, we finally met at Mount Field National Park in early February 2003. They were writing a book on their travels around Tasmania and had by then completed much of their itinerary, having previously spoken with numerous thylacine enthusiasts around the state. They interviewed me for several hours at the park before driving to Adamsfield, where I gave them a guided tour of the area. Rockman works with natural mediums — soil, blood, etc — and had a portfolio of native animals he had captured on paper along the way. His is a unique form of art and was used with good effect in illustrating their resulting book Carnivorous Nights: On the Trail of the Tasmanian Tiger.

***

Following a report I received from the Waddamana area of the Central Plateau in late February 2003, I drove up to investigate, and stayed for several nights in an old shooter’s hut in the State Forest. I walked the forest searching the many rocky outcrops that dotted the generally flat landscape, and during my investigation I located several small caves of some interest littered with devil scats and a mass of footprints on the dry silt floor. I also came across many hollowed-out tree trunks, no doubt the legacy of a bushfire that had swept the area some years previously, but unfortunately these revealed nothing of real interest. I especially targeted waterholes and small creeks, searching out prints wherever there was soft soil or mud. This type of country is predominantly rocky and covered with reasonably thick understorey brush, thus presenting only a slim chance of locating suitable tracks. It was an area to which I would return numerous times over the following months in the hope of locating a definite thylacine presence.

While there is always much public interest in Tasmanian tiger stories, this proved especially so for me during the month of August when I went to speak to a group of elderly women at a Southern Cross Care nursing home in the Hobart suburb of Sandy Bay. The youngest would have been around 80 years of age, and the oldest well into her 90s. When I first arrived, most were asleep in their chairs and my initial reaction was, ‘Oh no, whatever have I let myself in for here?’. When their carer clapped her hands and told them Mr Bailey had come to give a talk on the Tasmanian tiger, to a woman they immediately rallied, with each and every one of them giving me their undivided attention. For the next hour or so, I experienced a most interesting and rewarding time with these charming and extremely knowledgeable elderly women. Most of them claimed to have seen the last Tasmanian tiger in the Hobart Zoo prior to 1936, with several telling of their fathers actually hunting Tasmanian tigers during the bounty days. One woman claimed that, as a youngster, she was with her trapper father when he had snared a tiger in the bush.

‘The tiger acted very strangely,’ she told me, ‘cowering and trembling as we approached, but when my father attempted to release it from the snare, it turned nasty and he was forced to kill it. He had hoped to take it alive and take it down to the zoo in Hobart and sell it to Mr Reid.’

Another woman had once lived in the Huon Valley at Judbury and had personally known Charles and Denis King. She was able to give me a rare insight into the early exploration of the rugged hinterland of the Weld. I asked her if she had heard of Tasmanian tigers in the Weld Valley.

‘My word there were,’ she said. ‘My father saw them on numerous occasions, and he wasn’t one to exaggerate. And Charles King saw them too when he was out in the back country.’

‘Did you ever actually see one?’ I asked

‘The only one I ever saw was in the zoo, but there were many people living in the valley who had seen them back in the hills. Although I did a lot of bushwalking, I never ever saw one, which is surprising, really.’

‘Did you know old Bert?’ I asked.

‘I never knew Bert, but I did meet his father on several occasions. They were rumoured to have found tigers way back in the Weld, you know, but it was only a rumour, and you can’t always believe in rumours, can you? But I’m sure there was something in it because they were never ones to kid you on.’

This woman had walked the old Port Davey Track when young and spoke in glowing terms of the early bushwalking fraternity. It was an afternoon to remember, gainfully spent with this most delightful group of senior citizens.

Several weeks later, I conducted an extensive reconnaissance of the far north-east, driving to Cape Portland through the vast Rushy Lagoon property as well as exploring the many isolated beaches, including the beautiful Musselroe Bay. It wasn’t hard to imagine tigers traversing this region, as for many years there had been a host of quite believable reports of sightings coming from this lengthy stretch of remote coastline. This type of country is well placed to have a thylacine presence as, for the most part, it is well off the beaten track and rarely visited. Its isolation gives it the edge that is needed to protect the animal from human interference. However, this advantage is now fast disappearing as tourism rears its intrusive head in many such areas of Tasmania today, not to mention the wind farm explosion now occurring along the far east coast.

Returning to Gladstone, I diverted towards the Boobyalla River to investigate a sighting report I had received several months previously. I paid close attention to the coastal plains between the small locality of Boobyalla and the seaside township of Tomahawk, a distance of some 20 kilometres. The sandhill country fronting the coast is particularly interesting, and I spent many hours intensely scrutinising this stretch of coast where tigers had recently been reported in the dunes. I was especially searching for freshwater soaks, where tracks can be more clearly identified in damp sand. At one location, I found some very interesting but indeterminate prints in dry sand not far from the track, but try as I might, I found the sand too desiccated to take a reasonable cast. This type of country reminded me a lot of that of my first Tasmanian tiger experience along the Coorong some 35 years before.

Driving towards Bridport, I stopped off at the Great Forester River, walking seaward towards its confluence with Bass Strait, searching for prints as I went. Both this area and a vast swathe of coastal scrub running back towards Waterhouse Point, some 30 kilometres to the north-east, warranted further exploration. I visited many of the smaller towns on my way back down the east coast before returning by way of the inland route via St Marys, Conara and the Midland Highway. I was both surprised and alarmed by the increasing number of tourists in some of the more out-of-the-way places I visited. Unfortunately it seems that there will soon be few areas of Tasmania that are not susceptible to this invasion.