The recent TV programs about taxidermy have immediately made me want to ask the question:

What is the largest Australian species of animal that has never been taxidermied?

OK, it’s almost certainly the Australian snubfin dolphin (Orcaella heinsohni) – but apart from that?

Diprotodon…

A saltwater crocodile would be significantly larger than a snub nosed dolphin.

There’s even one for sale if you’ve got some spare change and want a conversation piece.

http://www.quicksales.com.au/ad/taxidermy-saltwater-crocodile-gigantic-specimen-14-feet-rare/10522336

I’m interested in what is the largest Australian native species (endemic or limited to Aus and nearest neighbouring countries) that has NOT been taxidermied and is NOT extinct.

I have a clear memory of seeing taxidermied specimens of:
Red kangaroo, Grey kangaroo, Wallaroo/Euro, Fairy penguin, Sugar glider, Saltwater crocodile, Paradise parrot (recently extinct).

I have a vague recollection of seeing taxidermied specimens of:
Bandicoot (eastern?), Quoll, Brushtail, Ringtail, Pretty-face wallaby, Platypus, Wombat, Flying fox (species?)

The web says there are taxidermied specimens of:
Koala, Emu, Cassowary, Goanna (species?), Wedgetail, Wallaby (species?), Freshwater crocodile (australian species?), Barramundi, Petrogale penicillata brush-tailed rock wallaby, Yellow-footed Antechinus flavipes, White cockatoo, Major Mitchell cockatoo, Tasmanian devil, Dingo, Australian pelican, Murray cod, Black swan, etc.
(see also news article from Nov 2014 19th-century-taxidermy-exhibition ).

Surprise, I didn’t find any taxidermied specimens of any venomous Australian snakes on the web.

What about these possibilities for the largest Australian native animal never taxidermied?

Perentie, Lace monitor, other Wallaby species, Hairy-nosed wombat, Brush turkey, Giant clam Tridacna gigas (australian but also as far north as the philippines), Morelia amethistina (australia’s largest snake), King brown Pseudechis australis, Australian bustard, Broad-shelled turtle Chelodina expansa (australia’s largest freshwater).

Sorry Moll,

I missed the “not” somehow.

I reckon you’d be hard pushed to find any vertebrate that doesn’t have a taxidermied type specimen sitting in a museum somewhere.

Teleost said:

I just borrowed a book: “Sharks and rays of Australia” Ed 2, by Last & Stevens, CSIRO. This book weighs about 5 kg. A substantial fraction of the 290 or so species of sharks and rays in the book, perhaps as many as a half, are only found in Australian waters.

I had no idea that Australia had anywhere near that many endemic sharks and rays

mollwollfumble said:

Teleost said:

I just borrowed a book: “Sharks and rays of Australia” Ed 2, by Last & Stevens, CSIRO. This book weighs about 5 kg. A substantial fraction of the 290 or so species of sharks and rays in the book, perhaps as many as a half, are only found in Australian waters.

I had no idea that Australia had anywhere near that many endemic sharks and rays

Tell you what I didn’t know is that there are two quolls native to Indonesia.

dv said:

mollwollfumble said:

Teleost said:

I just borrowed a book: “Sharks and rays of Australia” Ed 2, by Last & Stevens, CSIRO. This book weighs about 5 kg. A substantial fraction of the 290 or so species of sharks and rays in the book, perhaps as many as a half, are only found in Australian waters.

I had no idea that Australia had anywhere near that many endemic sharks and rays

Tell you what I didn’t know is that there are two quolls native to Indonesia.

Me too neither. Both are in Irian Jaya (Papua + West Papua).

I’m learning that one reason I didn’t know about all these sharks is that more than half have never been seen in surface waters. Judging by the small number of specimens found for many, I’d say that many more shark and ray species exist than have ever been identified. It would be difficult to write a TV documentary about shark species that have never been filmed in their natural environment.

Could dark matter have a force stronger than gravity?

Here’s a new discovery

Tiny octopus so cute it may be named ‘adorabilis’

CrazyNeutrino said:

Could dark matter have a force stronger than gravity?

Since the mass of the dark matter is defined by its apparent force, using the gravitational force of visible matter as the standard, no.

mollwollfumble said:

I just borrowed a book: “Sharks and rays of Australia” Ed 2, by Last & Stevens, CSIRO. This book weighs about 5 kg. A substantial fraction of the 290 or so species of sharks and rays in the book, perhaps as many as a half, are only found in Australian waters.

I had no idea that Australia had anywhere near that many endemic sharks and rays

I’m learning that one reason I didn’t know about all these sharks is that more than half have never been seen in surface waters. Judging by the small number of specimens found for many, I’d say that many more shark and ray species exist than have ever been identified. It would be difficult to write a TV documentary about shark species that have never been filmed in their natural environment.

Oh dear, wouldn’t it be embarrassing if the largest common Australian animal never taxidermied was the Flake, as in “Flake and chips”? Mustelus antarcticus, also known as Flake, Gummy Shark and Australian Smooth Hound, has the distinction of being one of the largest common sharks found in surface waters that is completely endemic to Australia. It grows to 185 cm long. Its jaws are for sale on ebay.

CrazyNeutrino said:

Could dark matter have a force stronger than gravity?

Yes it is possible, and that is what all the dark matter searches using particle accelerators and/or tanks of chemicals are based on.

It’s been clear from the start that dark matter doesn’t interact with anything by the strong force, so particle physicists have been looking for interactions with electrons and other subatomic particles via the weak and electromagnetic force. So far, they’ve drawn a blank. You know how a neutrino can pass through the Earth without hitting anything. Well, it’s been confirmed that any interaction between dark matter and normal matter has a cross section that is either zero, or many orders of magnitude smaller than that between neutrinos and normal matter.

mollwollfumble said:

mollwollfumble said:

I just borrowed a book: “Sharks and rays of Australia” Ed 2, by Last & Stevens, CSIRO. This book weighs about 5 kg. A substantial fraction of the 290 or so species of sharks and rays in the book, perhaps as many as a half, are only found in Australian waters.

I had no idea that Australia had anywhere near that many endemic sharks and rays

I’m learning that one reason I didn’t know about all these sharks is that more than half have never been seen in surface waters. Judging by the small number of specimens found for many, I’d say that many more shark and ray species exist than have ever been identified. It would be difficult to write a TV documentary about shark species that have never been filmed in their natural environment.

Oh dear, wouldn’t it be embarrassing if the largest common Australian animal never taxidermied was the Flake, as in “Flake and chips”? Mustelus antarcticus, also known as Flake, Gummy Shark and Australian Smooth Hound, has the distinction of being one of the largest common sharks found in surface waters that is completely endemic to Australia. It grows to 185 cm long. Its jaws are for sale on ebay.

Looking a bit more into the book. One startling thing for me is just how many of these shark, ray and chimaera species have received their scientific names (ie. been discovered) extremely recently. I count a whopping 80 new species discovered in the years 2007-2008, and many more in the ten years before that.

Going back to Flake, Mustelus antarcticus, 185 cm long, common, exclusively Australian endemic, seen in surface coastal waters. Other sharks and rays that fit that description, and are even a bit larger than that, include:

Gulf wobbegong, Orectolobus halei, 206 cm long confirmed, 290 cm long unconfirmed.
Australian blacktip shark, Carcharhinus tilstoni, 200 cm long (but closely resembles a larger wider-distributed species)
Melbourne skate, Spiniraja whitleyi, to about 200 cm long and more than 50 kg in weight.
Freshwater whipray, Himantura dalyensis, to at least 124 cm wide and about 270 cm long, this freshwater fish may also be found in the Fly River, which would make it not exclusively Australian.
Southern eagle ray, Myliobatis australis, 160 cm wide and more than 300 cm long.

Here they are in turn.

mollwollfumble said:

Looking a bit more into the book. One startling thing for me is just how many of these shark, ray and chimaera species have received their scientific names (ie. been discovered) extremely recently. I count a whopping 80 new species discovered in the years 2007-2008, and many more in the ten years before that.

That event ought to have been newsworthy.

Chondrichthyan fishes (Sharks, Rays and Chimeras).

Now reading the book introduction to learn how it is possible for 80 new species of Chondrichthyans to be discovered in Australian waters in 2007-2008. It’s mostly a case of science playing catch-up.

In 1940, some 162 Chondrichthyan species were known from Australian (which included PNG and hence equatorial species then) and New Zealand waters.
By 1989, that had been increased to 177 species in Australian waters alone.
In 1994, the first edition of “Sharks and Rays in Australia” had a whopping 296 species of which 97 had never been scientifically described.

Between 1994 and 2008, these 88 of these 97 Chondrichthyan species were given scientific names (I guess that the remaining nine turned out to be variants of previously known species). In addition to these, 7 more of the 296 were found to be new species, and an additional 29 species were found. In total 88+7+29 = 124 new Chondrichthyan species found in Australian waters were first scientifically described in these 14 years.

By 2009, the second edition of “Sharks and Rays of Australia” had 322 species of Chondrichthyans in Australian waters.
That’s 182 sharks, 125 rays and 15 chimeras.

Even though I’ve only started reading it, I can thoroughly recommend “Sharks and Rays of Australia” for anyone with an interest in Australian fauna. It’s one of those few books with a dual audience, both Joe Public and specialist Ichthyologists. All 322 species are illustrated, identification keys are given with good illustrations, worldwide distribution maps are given for every species and each species is allocated a page or two. And at the back is an illustrated checklist with common and scientific names.

The illustrations in “Sharks and Rays of Australia” are all hand painted and drawn to constant length (sharks and chimeras) or width (rays). With bird guides I’ve hated that – photos are far better for birds, but with large fish the use of hand-painted illustrations rather than photographs is a positive advantage.

>>Now reading the book introduction to learn how it is possible for 80 new species of Chondrichthyans to be discovered in Australian waters in 2007-2008.<<

Is that the year they were scientifically described or found?

PermeateFree said:

>>Now reading the book introduction to learn how it is possible for 80 new species of Chondrichthyans to be discovered in Australian waters in 2007-2008.<<

Is that the year they were scientifically described or found?

Scientifically described.

Am learning some interesting things about sharks from the introduction to that book. For instance, the piscatorial fauna of Australia more closely resembles that of South Africa than that of New Zealand.

Previously, I’d talked about “the human as a typical bear”, based largely on diet and size – in ancient times humans and bears would have been in direct competition for the same food.

But now I’m wondering about “the human as a typical shark”. I hadn’t known that some sharks are warm blooded, like humans. I hadn’t known that some sharks nurture their unborn babies through a placenta, like humans. They do. The size of a human is typical for a large shark. Some sharks live about the same number of years as a human, and become sexually mature at a similar age. Shark reproduction is much more like human reproduction than like the reproduction of many bony fish such as salmon. Fertilisation of sharks is internal, and many sharks have the same litter sizes as for example cats and dogs, as opposed to salmon who release between 2,500 and 7,000 eggs at a time and fertilise them externally. A few shark species produce one one to two offspring at a time, like humans. Also, the speed of a human in normal movement and in sprinting is similar to that of many sharks.

mollwollfumble said:

PermeateFree said:

>>Now reading the book introduction to learn how it is possible for 80 new species of Chondrichthyans to be discovered in Australian waters in 2007-2008.<<

Is that the year they were scientifically described or found?

Scientifically described.

In which case they were likely found over a number of years and described when the group was revised. However the world in our oceans especially in the deeper parts, is as unexplored as the distant planets we spend considerably more time and money trying to understand. Go figure!

PermeateFree said:

mollwollfumble said:

PermeateFree said:

>>Now reading the book introduction to learn how it is possible for 80 new species of Chondrichthyans to be discovered in Australian waters in 2007-2008.<<

Is that the year they were scientifically described or found?

Scientifically described.

In which case they were likely found over a number of years and described when the group was revised. However the world in our oceans especially in the deeper parts, is as unexplored as the distant planets we spend considerably more time and money trying to understand. Go figure!

Wasn’t at least one species extinct before it was scientifically described and what made it extinct? Us eating it? think it was a giant tortise. Maybe I’m recalling incorrectly, perhaps it was one hundred years after discovery that it was finally described and it went extinct not long after.

PermeateFree said:

mollwollfumble said:

PermeateFree said:

>>Now reading the book introduction to learn how it is possible for 80 new species of Chondrichthyans to be discovered in Australian waters in 2007-2008.<<

Is that the year they were scientifically described or found?

Scientifically described.

In which case they were likely found over a number of years and described when the group was revised. However the world in our oceans especially in the deeper parts, is as unexplored as the distant planets we spend considerably more time and money trying to understand. Go figure!

Lately I have been “go figure“ing. Many deep water species have come up in trawl nets and there are plenty of those, some would argue too many, especially when they strip-bare seamounts that are supposed to be in international protected waters. Of scientific explorations of the deep ocean, have there been more or fewer than scientific explorations of outer space? Certainly with the deep ocean they started earlier, and names of scientific deep sea exploration research vessels are known, if not as well as the names of outer space spacecraft.

I occasionally try to “go figure” what would be the best way to study life on the deep ocean – such as on the continental shelf and abyssal regions – but haven’t yet come to any firm conclusions. I still bemoan how small the number of wild species are on Earth that can so far be identified by DNA alone. And it is absolutely certain that large numbers of new oceanic species are still to be found.

mollwollfumble said:

Going back to Flake, Mustelus antarcticus, 185 cm long, common, exclusively Australian endemic, seen in surface coastal waters. Other sharks and rays that fit that description, and are even a bit larger than that, include:

Gulf wobbegong, Orectolobus halei, 206 cm long confirmed, 290 cm long unconfirmed.
Australian blacktip shark, Carcharhinus tilstoni, 200 cm long (but closely resembles a larger wider-distributed species)
Melbourne skate, Spiniraja whitleyi, to about 200 cm long and more than 50 kg in weight.
Freshwater whipray, Himantura dalyensis, to at least 124 cm wide and about 270 cm long, this freshwater fish may also be found in the Fly River, which would make it not exclusively Australian.
Southern eagle ray, Myliobatis australis, 160 cm wide and more than 300 cm long.

There may be an even longer surface coastal endemic chondrichthyan species. Dwarf sawfish, Pristis clavita. Don’t be fooled by the name “dwarf”, this monster has been confirmed up to at least 310 cm long. It’s still unsure if it’s only found in Australia, some tentative sightings have been noted in Indonesian waters.

——-

I know I’ve talked before about whether a shape that bulges in the middle could be better for aeroplanes and rockets than present cylindrical designs. The fastest shark in the sea, the Shortfin mako Isurus oxyrinchus has a body shape extremely reminiscent of some symmetrical aerofoils, but not at all reminiscent of recent rocket and aeroplane body shapes.

——-

The large number of localised chondrichthyan species caught me completely by surprise. I had thought that new species develop when races of an existing species become geographically isolated. But continental shelves stretch unbroken around all the continents, and temperatures in these regions are remarkably uniform. So how are new species of such oceanic creatures generated?

the yanks came up with a nuclear sub that was bulged in the middle

this is the more efficient shape in the water

>>Lately I have been “go figure“ing. Many deep water species have come up in trawl nets and there are plenty of those, some would argue too many, especially when they strip-bare seamounts that are supposed to be in international protected waters. Of scientific explorations of the deep ocean, have there been more or fewer than scientific explorations of outer space? Certainly with the deep ocean they started earlier, and names of scientific deep sea exploration research vessels are known, if not as well as the names of outer space spacecraft.<<

There have been more landings on the moon, than have been made to the deepest parts of the oceans.

PermeateFree said:

>>Lately I have been “go figure“ing. Many deep water species have come up in trawl nets and there are plenty of those, some would argue too many, especially when they strip-bare seamounts that are supposed to be in international protected waters. Of scientific explorations of the deep ocean, have there been more or fewer than scientific explorations of outer space? Certainly with the deep ocean they started earlier, and names of scientific deep sea exploration research vessels are known, if not as well as the names of outer space spacecraft.<<

There have been more landings on the moon, than have been made to the deepest parts of the oceans.

But fewer manned landings on the furthest parts of the solar system, more trawlers than spacecraft, and more fishermen than astronomers.

mollwollfumble said:

PermeateFree said:

>>Lately I have been “go figure“ing. Many deep water species have come up in trawl nets and there are plenty of those, some would argue too many, especially when they strip-bare seamounts that are supposed to be in international protected waters. Of scientific explorations of the deep ocean, have there been more or fewer than scientific explorations of outer space? Certainly with the deep ocean they started earlier, and names of scientific deep sea exploration research vessels are known, if not as well as the names of outer space spacecraft.<<

There have been more landings on the moon, than have been made to the deepest parts of the oceans.

But fewer manned landings on the furthest parts of the solar system, more trawlers than spacecraft, and more fishermen than astronomers.

I think you miss the point.

Just found out that the Melbourne Shark and ray centre that used to be in Dandenong, shut down earlier this month :(
I had been hoping to go there to find out about growth rates, sizes and ages, etc.

All its animals have been transferred to Port Stevens.