native tiger

plural native tigers · alternative Native Tiger

1. obsoleteTasmanian tiger (Thylacinus cynocephalus)

   Of the carnivora the largest is an animal known as the hyæna, or, native tiger, which grows to the size of a large dog.

   1859, William Fairfax, editor, Handbook to Australasia; Being a Brief Historical and Descriptive Account of Victoria, Tasmania, South Australia, New South Wales, Western Australia, and New Zealand, page 103

   2 more examples

   The “Native Tigers” (Thylacinus cynocephalus) are yet more to be dreaded among sheep than the “devils;” but, fortunately, they are far less numerous.

   1852, Louisa Anne Meredith, My Home in Tasmania, During a Residence of Nine Years, volume 2, page 264

   Upon my first visit to the cavern, my suspicions fell upon the Thylacinus, or native tiger, as the animal most likely to have carried these bones into it.

   1886, Samuel Henry Wintle, “The Fossil Mammalian Remains of Tasmania Compared with Those of the Mainland”, in The Victorian Naturalist: The Journal & Magazine of the Field Naturalists' Club of Victoria, volume 3, number 4, page 40