This story is about tigers and a mysterious loss. Did that get your attention?

Unfortunately, this story is not about the Richmond Football Club, or even the football.

Tragic tale: The last known Tasmanian tiger, seen in 1936, the year it died in a Hobart zoo. Credit:Tasmanian Museum

It's related to Tasmanian Tigers, or thylacines, those stripe-backed, meat-eating marsupials that died out in the island state in the 1930s due to human hunting.

It is not as well known that thylacines also used to roam mainland Australia and died out a few thousand years ago.