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A: It's a carnivorous marsupial that's shaped like a wolf, striped
like a tiger, and has a pouch like a kangaroo. It's like some kind
of mythical chimera brought to life. There's nothing else like it.
The animal's strangeness led early colonists to call it a
bewildering array of names, including zebra opossum, zebra wolf,
hyena, and tiger wolf. These days it's often called the thylacine,
short for its scientific name, Thylacinus cynocephalus.
A: They have a taxidermy of a Tasmanian tiger  at the American Museum of Natural History in
Manhattan. For years it stood in the same place, inside its own
glass case. Usually you think of taxidermy as stiff, even
creepy---but this one was incredibly lifelike. It had this
friendly, smiley shape to its mouth. We fantasized about it coming
alive and running out of the museum.
A: Partly. Most scientists believe the Tasmanian tiger is extinct.
The last one verified alive died in a zoo in Tasmania in 1936. It's
a very sad story. But there are also people in Tasmania who swear
they see tigers  in the wild. It's hard to accept
that such an iconic animal---the island's apex predator---is no
longer around. Numerous searches have been launched over the years,
but none have ever come back with any convincing physical evidence
to indicate that the tiger survives. It's very intriguing. On top
of that, a few years ago scientists in Australia decided to try to
bring the Tasmanian tiger back to life through cloning. They were
going to use DNA from a museum specimen [a pickled pouch pup in a
jar] and basically jump-start the species back into existence. When
we heard about this Jurassic Park-inspired cloning project,
we decided to go and see for ourselves.
A: Tasmania reminded us of Alice in Wonderland. There's a
slightly hallucinogenic feel to its landscapes. In the Northwest,
giant boulders that line  the coast are
blanketed with red and orange lichen. They light up like neon at
sunset. The rain forests are filled with gnarled old trees ferns
that can grow 30 feet tall. And the animals are trippy, too. There
are land leeches that hang around on tree branches---and they latch
on to you while you're walking through the woods. That was one of
our biggest fears. Plus, there are three species of snake on the
island ... all of them poisonous.
A: Once, we thought we were being carjacked  by a fatigue-wearing eco-warrior. Another time we
wandered into a theme bar in a small town called Mole Creek that
was filled with hundreds of paintings, drawings, cartoons, and
sculptures of the Tasmanian tiger. It was like the Louvre for
obsessed thylacine lovers. There was even a mural of a biker chick
with a tattoo of a tiger print on her butt cheek. It was
anatomically
correct---the paw print, that is.
A: One night we dragged a roadkill wallaby behind our car to
attract Tasmanian devils to a midnight feast. It was like chumming
terrestrial style.
A: We met about 15 years ago and have been writing partners for
nearly as long. Our first book, Wild New York, was about the
unexpected wildlife and natural history to be found in the Big
Apple. We also wrote feature articles for the New York
Times, almost all of them chronicling some "adventure" we had
with local wildlife. In one, we raced a homing pigeon 500 miles
from western Pennsylvania back to its coop in Brooklyn. We won ---
but only by five minutes. And we were driving a car. The pigeon was
just going on wing power and instinct.
A: Yes! But it was hard work. We had never written anything this
long before. So we mapped out the chapters to make it seem more
do-able.
A: Michael's brother Gregory Crewdson is an artist, too. And
knowing that we would have a lot in common with Alexis---who
specializes in painting strange and wonderful biological
entities---Greg suggested we give Alexis a call a few years back.
As soon as we met, we immediately got to work on a project
together. It was a book called Concrete Jungle.
A: That's tough. We might have to split up for this one:
I'm a huge Redmond
O'Hanlon fan. He's traveled to some horrible places and managed to
come back with hilarious, moving tales. No Mercy and
Trawler are my favorites. But the scene of O'Hanlon drugging
with the Yanomami Indians in In Trouble Again is
priceless.
I mostly read mushroom
 guides, but my favorite recent book is The
Secret Life of Wombats by the Australian author James Woodford.
I love Woodford because he plunges fearlessly into the subjects he
covers---including wombat burrows.
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