33 



EEMARKS ON MR. KREFFT'S "NOTES ON THE 

 FAUNA OF TASMANIA."* 



By Morton Allpokt, F.L.S., F.Z.S. 



No one can deny that advantage is to be derived from 

 scientific statistics concerning our natural history, especially 

 from such pamphlets as that presented to the Society by Mn 

 Krefft, and our cordial thanks are due to that gentleman for 

 his courtesy in so soon forwarding us a copy. 



It was not to be expected that, with the limited collection 

 before him, Mr. Krefft could make anything like an exhaustive 

 list of our Fauna, therefore, as the Council of this Society 

 will probably republish Mr. Krefft' s notes in the Transactions, 

 the value of those notes may be enhanced by calling attention 

 to those parts to which additions ought to be made, and to 

 some conclusions arrived at by the author which, in my 

 opinion, are likely to prove erroneous. 



In Placentalia, Mr. Krefft places first on the list Canis dingo^ 

 the Dingo, and adds " now extinct." What evidence has the 

 author of its former existence in Tasmania? I never heard 

 of one having been seen in this colony, or of the bones of one 

 ever having Ijeen found ; of course this is no proof that the 

 Dingo never existed here, but I consider the presence of the 

 Thylacinus and Sarcopliilus (Tiger and Devil) as very strong 

 presumptive evidence that the Dingo never did exist here, 

 even without the negative evidence above mentioned. If the 

 Dingo had been absent in Victoria and New South Wales, my 

 conviction is that the Tiger and Devil would still be keeping 

 down the excessive increase of Kangaroos and other herbi- 

 vorous marsupials, instead of their bones only being found in 

 the tertiary deposits of those colonies ; in other words the 

 Dingo being of a higher type and greater intelligence would, 

 if present here, have rapidly driven out the marsupial carnivora, 

 and we in Tasmania should have had to search our bone caves 

 or other tertiary deposits (as they now have to do in the 

 neighboring colonies) for proof of their former existence. 



Referring to No. 8 on the list, Mus Tasmaniensis (Kr.), this 

 may be the species common on Mt. Wellington, and which I 

 have regarded as identical with Mus fuscipes (the dusky-footed 

 rat) figured in part 3 of Gould's Mammals of Australia. In 

 addition to this species two other small rodents are known, 

 both from Port Davey, the skins of which were brought to 



*See Appendix, 



