X-rays show skull of extinct thylacine in collector's auction find

X-rays confirm skull of extinct thylacine in UK collector's rare auction find In short: X-rays of a taxidermied head advertised as a fox at auction have confirmed the specimen is an extinct thylacine, with the animal's near-perfect skull shown intact within. UK collector James Cranfield purchased the mounted head at auction for £62,000 ($120,000) in an energetic bidding war, well above the expected price. What's next? The verified specimen will now be listed in the International Thylacine Specimen Database, and DNA samples will be collected by scientists, including the Colossal Bioscience team working on the thylacine de-extinction project. Testing of the mounted head of a thylacine discovered by accident in an auction house catalogue has confirmed its authenticity as the extinct Tasmanian tiger. X-rays of the taxidermy head, which is believed to have been preserved sometime in the late 1800s, show that beneath wads of stuffing is a full, uncut skull. "It is indeed a thylacine," natural history collector and specimen owner James Cranfield said. "It has been confirmed by experts as being a genuine, previously undocumented, newly discovered specimen of the extinct Tasmanian tiger. "It is a ridiculously important and special specimen. "The most amazing thing is the absolute completeness and the almost perfect state of the skull within." Mr Cranfield called the find "a discovery of a lifetime", saying "it is the holy grail of natural history collecting". It has drawn interest from academics, museums and the scientific community, including a team of scientists who hope to "de-extinct" the species. The mounted head, which was sold in poor condition, had been listed as a fox's head in a UK auction house general sale and was expected to fetch between £30 ($57) to £50 ($95). But an astute Mr Cranfield, who owns a curiosity shop in Bristol and has collected taxidermies and curiosities for his "entire life", said he immediately recognised the listing was incorrect after inspecting the animal's teeth. Loading...He noted that while foxes and dogs have six upper incisors between the canines, marsupials such as the thylacine have eight incisors. After a heated bidding war with another collector, the thylacine was bought for £62,600 ($120,000), including auction fees. Immediately afterwards, he held a sale of his private collection, as well as the contents of his shop, in a bid to recoup the cost. The verified specimen will now be listed in the International Thylacine Specimen Database (ITSD). ITSD director, Steven Sleightholme, confirmed the skull's authenticity. In a letter to Mr Cranfield, he wrote: "I am pleased to confirm the radiographs of the skull, particularly the dentition, establishes that your mounted taxidermied head is indeed that of a thylacine. "It is unfortunate the specimen comes without any provenance, but nevertheless well done for recognising such a remarkable rarity." Dr Sleightholme stressed the importance of the find, saying that only 16 Tasmanian tiger specimens — including the mount — were held in private hands, with the remainder held in university or museum collections. "Your specimen is particularly significant because there are only two known thylacine head mounts," he wrote. "[Due to] the rarity and significance of the mount, it will be particularly important that any intervention is carried out with great care and kept to a minimum." The ITSD has recorded 815 specimens around the world, which could range from a "microscopic slide" of tissue to a full mount. Skull 'should be kept as is' Mr Cranfield said other collectors may have been thrown off as to the specimen's true identity due to its "naive mount", with its googly eyes and a bulbous forehead that should have been more streamlined. X-rays have revealed the early techniques used, including a traditional "wood wool and tow" stuffing of shredded wood shavings with a smooth outer layer of coarse hemp to create the detailing. Mr Cranfield said the radiograph showed that too much stuffing had been used, perhaps due to the taxidermist being unfamiliar with thylacines. "The amount of stuffing within the skin has given it very different proportions to what a Tasmanian tiger would look like," he said. But despite the imperfections, Mr Cranfield argues the specimen should be left as is. At some stage he may replace the existing eyes with antique glass eyes to be more in keeping with the time. "I am of the personal opinion of leaving it as is. It is a historic piece and will never be perfect," he said. "Even if you tried to rehydrate that skin and tried to remount it, we are losing an historically prepared piece. I think it can offer a lot more as it is, than trying to make it look pretty." Specimen to inform de-extinction project For the moment, the skull is no longer on display. Mr Cranfield said that while the purpose of buying the mount was to share it with the world, the priority was to keep it safe. He said the head was no longer on his shop premises and was in a safe in a secure location. "The burden of being a custodian of such a special thing is now weighing heavily on my shoulders,"he said. "The next steps are to allow the continued availability of it to the academic community, get that DNA, and hopefully get it on display somewhere where the public can see it." University of Melbourne professor Andrew Pask, the chief biology officer at Colossal Laboratory and Biosciences, is part of a scientific team working to "de-extinct" the thylacine. Researchers at the US science startup say they have brought dire wolves back from extinction and have worked on "de-extincting" the New Zealand moa. He said while the taxidermy thylacine "was not a pristine specimen by any stretch" it could be a "really interesting one". Through genome sequencing and DNA testing, Dr Pask believed the provenance of this particular specimen could also be traced. "We're hoping to sample it within the next couple of months and it won't take too long after that to get a genome,"he said. "We could possibly figure out where this specimen might have come from and which era it was collected in. "Every single genome that we can get from a thylacine helps. It gives us a deeper understanding of what that population looked like so we can get an understanding of differences that existed between individuals in that population and that's important to creating a healthy population again, one that handles diseases and other changes in the environment." In its work, the team used modified grey wolf genes to create embryos to be implanted into surrogates that gave birth to pups. The modifications were based on analysis of DNA extracted from two dire wolf fossils. It has been nearly 90 years to the day since Tasmania's last thylacine died in a Hobart zoo on September 7, 1936, a date that has since been commemorated as World Threatened Species Day. [Image text:] @thetaxidermist