The carnivorous marsupial from Tasmania, also called the Tasmanian tiger, was the thylacine.
The thylacine (Thylacinus cynocephalus) was a dog-like predator with dark stripes across its back and rump. Despite its wolfish appearance, it was a marsupial, and females carried young in a pouch. It once lived across mainland Australia, New Guinea, and Tasmania, although it had disappeared from the mainland thousands of years ago.
European settlers in Tasmania viewed thylacines as threats to livestock. Hunting bounties, habitat loss, competition with introduced animals, disease, and low genetic diversity all contributed to its decline. The last known wild thylacine was killed in 1930, while the last captive animal died at Hobart Zoo on September 7, 1936.
A common mix-up is confusing the thylacine with the Tasmanian devil. The devil is a smaller living marsupial; the thylacine was a separate, larger predator. The nickname “Tasmanian tiger” refers to the stripes, not to a relationship with true tigers.