Is It Our Fault or Is It Their Time?

For many observers, there is a conservation crisis on the Australian island of Tasmania. Many are familiar with the Tasmanian devil, a small, yet fierce meat eating marsupial that has resided on the island for thousands of years. Fossil records indicate that the devil resided on the actual continent of Australia up to 600 years ago. But the rise of dingo (a wild dog) populations led to the eventual extinction of the creature on the continent. Trouble is that we (humans) brought the dingo to Australia in the first place, hence disturbing the natural ecological balance.

As of now, there are only 80,000 devils remaining on the island. That doesn’t sound too bad, right? Look at it this way, as of 1990 there were over 140,000 devils on the island; that is almost half of the population gone in less than two decades. What is causing the devil to die off? The cause is a large outbreak of tumors, more specifically facial tumors that lead to the eventual starvation and death of the creature. Scientists discovered that due to a lack of genetic diversity, the remaining devils develop tumors because their systems do not have the ability to ward off infection from biting which is rather common amongst the devil.

In short, the mechanism that most creatures have that short out tumors before they start to grow is absent in the devil. This dilemma is comparable to per say primates that inbreed. A prime example would be English monarchs of the past centuries. If you recall, they would only have kids within the family, which would lead to genetic conditions and their eventual deaths. This is the case for the devils. Because they are so genetically similar, their immune systems have mutated, which makes them prime candidates for disease.

Many would argue that this is the natural cycle of life; Darwinism, survival of the fittest. If a creature cannot adapt, it is not meant to survive; a new creature will take the extinct one’s place. But as mentioned above, their very survival has been put in jeopardy by our actions of the past. We brought the wild dog to Australia, which in turn forced the devil the find refuge in an isolated environment. So the question still remains; did we do it? Or is it their time?