Thylacines are a new facination for me and I've been able to learn quite a bit in the passed little while. I've already mentioned to my husband that I would like to vacation in Tasmania at some point. (Just to go camping, of course!!)

I wrote to the person that sent me the video and gave them my 'take' on the movement.. this is what I sent.

The animal is a very heavy mover and isn't used to that sort of speed. By the time it reaches the far side of the road it's tiring considerably, meaning it looks like it could stop at any second. Something must have really spooked it. It looks awkward, I suppose would be the right term. It moves like a great dane would move but it shouldn't move like that because it's legs are much more compact. And that tail!!!!! The tail doesn't move much at all, but then it wasn't turning.. just running mostly straight. I don't imagine it would be very easy for that animal to take tight or quick turns. Most animals with any sort of jointed tail use it as a sort of a rudder. That tail doesn't look like it's flexible enough to be used like that.. it looks way too heavy.

Looking at it frame by frame, you can tell it's striped from right behind the withers/shoulders to mid tail. (as far as I could tell) It also looks male to me. The one thing that bothered me about the video was the ears. The pictures of the thylacines that I've seen look to have very thick ears that stand upright. The video shows the ears on the animal doing a good deal of 'flopping around'. That could be because it's not so much running as it is slamming off the ground. Very very heavy mover. I also noticed the awkwardness of the strides it was taking. It was obviously spooked but still wasn't taking, what I would call, full strides. Very choppy movements. The films taken of thylacines in the zoos show they have withers instead of shoulders, which would (usually) mean more freedom of movement. But the tylacine still doesn't move like it has a 'normal' range of movement for an animal built like that.

. I said that the animal looked like it wasn't used to moving that quickly. Well, the first time I watched it this morning I realized WHY it looked so awkward. It changed leads 3 or 4 times from one side of the road to the other. In horse-speak a "lead" is whichever front foot the horse starts off with in a gallop or canter. This guy on the film changes several times. It was as if he wasn't sure exactly how to go about that running business and kept changing his mind.