Thylacine enthusiasts unearthed a 21-second video of the last Tasmanian Tiger in captivity from National Film and Sound Archives or the NFSA. It has been 85 years since the video was publicly viewed.

Benjamin, the Last Tasmanian Tiger

The footage features a male thylacine, named Benjamin, in its enclosure at Hobart's Beaumaris Zoo in Australia. In 1935, Brisbane filmmaker Sidney Cook filmed the thylacine for Tasmania the Wonderland. A few months later in 1936, the thylacine died due to the cold brought by being locked out of its confinement.

The film showed the Tasmanian tiger going around a paved enclosure while onlookers were rattling the cage. The narrator related that Benjamin is the only Tasmanian Tiger in captivity in the world. It also said that the Tasmanian tiger is very rare and that the march of civilization has forced them out of their natural habitat.

Simon Smith, the curator from the NFSA, said the video was truly precious as it is the last known surviving footage of the thylacine. The film was shot between February and March 1935 but had been lost in the archives since. He admits that there are over 2 million items in the collection, and they have difficulty looking at everything.

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Branden Holmes, one of those who found the video footage, he was delighted to find the video footage, but the sight of the last Tasmanian tiger in bare concrete and being provoked is sad to see.

Tasmanian tigers are not aggressive animals, and the team is getting insights into its behavior.

Holmes plans to publish a paper on the last thylacine. Watch the video below from Mike Williams on YouTube.

Documentary for the quest of the extinct Tasmanian Tiger

Tasmanian tigers have been declared extinct for eight years. Many people, around 8,000 members on Facebook, however, believe that the animal survived in remote areas of Tasmania and the mainland.

During the European settlement, it is estimated that 5,000 thylacines were thriving in Australia. Excessive hunting, destruction of habitat, and introduction of the disease led to the rapid decline and eventual extinction of the species.

Their group, named Thylacine Awareness Group of Australia is led by their president, Neil Waters. The group is convinced that the Tasmanian tiger still roams the island state and mainland.

Waters claimed that he had two sightings of the "Tassie" himself. The Facebook Group and website share their items of evidence gathered all over the country. The group also shares interesting information about the animals, including habits, mannerisms, and sightings. Photos of animals believed to be eaten by the thylacine, paw prints, night vision capture of wildlife in the bush, and video still are being exchanged in the group's webpages.

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Members of the group use various types of technology, including cameras and thermal-imaging drones to find thylacines.

The group's quest for the thylacine caught the attention of local documentary makers, David Elliot-Jones and Naomi Ball. Screen Australia will award them a $ 50,000 grant to make a documentary project, Searching for the Tassie Tiger.

The film will be shot once the pandemic crisis is over in the northeast and northwest of Tasmania. The producer aims to finish the film by September and targets to release it next year.

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