Tasmanian Devils: History |
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The
Tasmanian Devil currently only lives in the Austraian state of
Tasmania. Fossils show that they did exist on the Australian mainland,
but have died out. When the first Tasmanian settlers came, they came with live stock. The settlers observed that the devils were attacking and eating the livestock. Therefore, their food stocks depleted quickly. The settlers didn’t want all of their live stock killed so they tried to capture as many devils as they could, after capturing the settlers would cook them and eat them. Over the next 100 years the trapping and poisoning of devils brought the devils to the brink of extinction. In 1936 people noticed the decrease in devils, so in 1941 the Tasmanian devil became a protected species, the population slowly recovered. There are currently approximately 100,000-150,000 devils in Tasmania. |
| Copyright 2006 | |