Community & Business
15 July, 2024
Rare Ice Age Marsupial Lion discovered
Clifton’s amateur palaeontologist, Ian Sobbe, has spent a lifetime finding important fossil remains of Ice Age Mega Fauna but his most recent discovery is his most important and has excited palaeontologists around Australia and even overseas.
Ian’s discovery was of a cheetah sized marsupial lion called Thylacoleo carnifex and what makes this find so unusual is that as an apex marsupial carnivore there have been very few fossil remains found.
In any ecosystem carnivores make up only 5 to 7 per cent of the fauna so their skeletal remains are significantly fewer than herbivores.
Associate Professor Gilbert Price of the School of the Environment at the University of Queensland told the Clifton Courier that Ian Sobbe’s discovery is an extraordinary and important find ranking in the top two or three of entire skeletons of a Thylacoleo for the Australian continent.
Ian’s marsupial lion is thought to be a juvenile who lived during the Pleistocene Epoch Ice Age (2.58 million to 11,700 years ago) and it is estimated this particular juvenile roamed the
Darling Downs 100,000 years ago.
The Thylacoleo lived during the time when the giant Mega Fauna occupied the Australian continent.
One of the great controversies around the period of the giant Mega Fauna is the reason behind their extinction with climate change, over hunting by humans and habitat destruction by fires set by humans as three possible causes.
Scientists are not generally in agreement as to the cause of the extinction with a lack of evidence to fully support any theory.
Ian Sobbe has spent much of his life scouring the exposed creek beds around Clifton in search of Mega Fauna fossil remains.
He now has one of the most extensive private collections of Mega Fauna fossils that may even rival many museums, all professionally housed and curated.
The day of the Thylacoleo discovery was like many others for Ian as he walked along a dry creek bed.
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What took his attention at one point was something that, to the untrained eye, was of no importance but Ian’s trained eye zoned in on an object protruding from the creek bed.
As he began to dig around the object he started to become very interested but the fading light eventually drove him home.
Ian’s wife Dianne said he was wildly excited when he arrived because he had begun to realise the object was something very special.
Associate Professor Gilbert Price said it was
Ian’s skill, knowledge and passion that had given him the desire to examine the object in greater detail where others would not have bothered.
Ian returned to the creek bed the next day ready to begin further exploration and maybe even extraction of the fossil remains.
Extraction Process
Finding a fossil protruding from a creek bed is one thing but extracting all the attached skeletal remains undamaged requires a special set of skills.
The skeleton was in a position that made it very susceptible to damage from heavy rain and flooding, so a decision was made to remove it as quickly as possible, but also retaining as much information as possible.
Gilbert Price made the comment that Ian is one of the few people with the skill set to extract the find undamaged.
It took Ian and a group of helpers three days to excavate the block of sediment containing the fossils.
Digging around the fossils, they put a jacket of hessian soaked in plaster of paris around the block to stop it disintegrating while it was being removed from the site.
Transporting the block of sediment out of the creek bed and onto a vehicle took a team of seven people using a purpose built stretcher.
A tractor was used to carry the block from the transport vehicle into the shed at Ian’s property.
Once safely in the shed the bones were allowed to dry before a substantial layer of calcium carbonate was removed with air scribes.
The bones were found to be in pristine condition but Ian then applied a conservation grade consolidant to give ongoing protection.
The bones of this juvenile Thylacoleo were now ready for examination by scientists eager for the opportunity and all thanks to the skills of amateur palaeontologist, Clifton’s own Ian Sobbe.
Mysterious death of juvenile Thylacoleo solved
Ian and Gilbert both wondered as to the cause of death of the juvenile carnivore.
The intact nature of the skeleton suggested it had not been as a result of an attack by a larger animal.
Ian concluded that the greatly enlarged sectorial pre-molar teeth of the Thylacoleo are purpose designed for stripping carcasses of flesh and chewing bones of its prey.
Interestingly this individual had overused his lower pre-molars, breaking the anterior corner of both teeth.
This damage occurred before its death and Ian and Gilbert concluded the damage likely allowed an infection to develop that caused severe bone loss adjacent to the root of one pre-molar tooth.
The extreme pain associated with this infection would likely have led to the animal’s demise from malnutrition due to a reduced ability to kill and feed.
Septicemia from the infection could have added significantly to the animal’s problems and so the 100,000 year old cold case mystery of the death of the juvenile marsupial lion has possibly be solved.
Scientists descend on Clifton
News of the Thylacoleo find by Ian Sobbe circulated in the scientific community but a full media release was withheld for some weeks, however, in the meantime a group of twenty scientists drove quietly into Clifton.
They booked into the town’s hotels for overnight accommodation and evening meals and took breakfast the next day at Dusty’s cafe.
However, it was not the attraction of the town’s hotels or the excellent coffee and food at Dusty’s that had drawn them to Clifton - it was, of course, the news of Ian Sobbe’s discovery.
The Clifton Courier was present when the scientists gathered in Ian’s shed to
view the fossil remains , and their interest and understanding of the importance of the find was clearly evident.
As the scientists entered Ian’s room of Mega Fauna fossils their interest in the collection was immediate and they were astonished that a retired country farmer could have such an important and extensive collection.
Ian Sobbe’s contribution to the prehistoric history of the Darling Downs was summed up by Dr Andrew Rozefelds, Principal Scientist of Geosciences of the Queensland Museum.
“Over four decades Ian Sobbe, working closely with researchers at the Queensland Museum and University of Queensland, has significantly contributed to the discovery, preparation and study of the megafauna of the Darling Downs,” he said.
“Long before the term ‘Citizen Scientist’ was even coined, Ian was documenting the remarkable animals that lived on the Darling Downs in the past.
“The recently discovered Thylacoleo specimen, that was found by Ian, is one of the most complete known from northern Australia,“ he said.
Opportunity Lost
Several years ago a group of locals known as the Clifton Megafauna Group, saw the benefits for Clifton if Ian Sobbe’s unique collection of Mega Fauna fossils could be used to establish a museum in the town.
Clifton already has a wonderful Pioneer Museum and a museum of prehistoric Mega Fauna fossils discovered right here on the Darling Downs would have complemented the Pioneer Museum perfectly.
The town of Winton in outback Queensland has attracted thousands of visitors to its Dinosaur museum - could a Clifton Mega Fauna Museum achieve something similar?
Unless Clifton finds a way to keep the Sobbe collection in the town the Queensland Museum will ultimately take ownership for exhibition in Brisbane or Toowoomba.
In the meantime Ian Sobbe’s work as an amateur palaeontologist is helping to solve the mystery of the Darling Downs Mega Fauna and what caused their extinction.
