In Search of the Ozenkadnook Tiger
The mainland thylacine hot spot in Australia las long been the South and East Gippsland region of Victoria. But there is another area which boasts many sightings of and stock kills carried out by a mysterious thylacine-like creature. This is the country bounded by the towns of Horsham to the north of the Grampians Ranges, and Hamilton to their south, by the Bass Strait coast and the towns of Kingston and Bordertown in South Australia. This "thylacine triangle" has long been known as the haunt of
a creature called variously the Ozenkadnook Tiger or, sometimes, the Tantanoola Beast or the Goroke Monster.
Back in 1964 a certain Miss Rilla Martin was holidaying in the Goroke area and she chanced to take a photograph which has puzzled and intrigued people ever since. The animal, whatever it is, has come to be popularly called Rilla's Critter. It is one of the most famous images in all of Cryptozoology and is to be seen at numerous sites around the web. But what to make of it? The tail and hips look about right for Thylacinus cynocephalus, the muscular shoulders fit in well - but what about the stripes? They look all wrong. Could be a trick of the light, caused by dappled shading under the trees? People have been finding fault with it for decades, even suggesting that Rilla faked it and so on. Well, here I'm gonna stick my neck out in support of Rilla. I personally think it might be the real McCoy. And if it is ............. ????
Last week I decided to go take a look for myself. The trip was a bit of a fizzer in terms of action but some of you folks have asked about Rilla's Critter from time to time, so here is what happened.
Goroke revisited
Well, we arrived at the town of Goroke, population 350, then followed the road
to the patch of scrub where Rilla saw her critter. And this is it, if my navigation be correct, a patch of scrubby eucalypts near a cross-roads, 11 miles west of Goroke. It's still here, nearly 40 years on. Trouble is, it's an isolated stand of trees only a few miles across, a lonely relict of the forest which once carpeted these western plains. It's completely surrounded by open farmland. There's no way wild animals of any size could linger in here. That's quite impossible. No animal tracks, the place is silent apart from birds and the bleating of sheep in the distance.
Back to Ozenkadnook
We power through the heart of the scrub and trees and head south, in search of Ozenkadnook. Crossing this scrubland only takes 20 minutes. We stop for one last look around. Is the place as dead as I thought? Maybe not - there are some animal tracks about after all. The big one's a feral cat, I'd say.
Er ... NOT the fabled BIG CAT of central Victoria : this one's plainly just a domestic moggie gone wild. And the smaller one, with the long sharp claws? Hard to say. A bandicoot, maybe? But is this scrub a potential refuge for prehistoric monsters? Alas, not a chance!
We find the road to Ozenkadnook. It's not a town but a locality to the SW
of Goroke. But it's ALL open farmland. Sheep, mostly. Of potential refugia, there is no sign. This is quite aggravating because the flora cover we find on the ground does not tally with what's indicated on my topographical
maps, current as of 1976. This district is supposed to be covered by light scrub and broken forest. But we see before us well managed farms sprinkled with isolated stands of gum trees. It's high time to get my satellite imaging project up and running: before we leave home we really need to see how the countryside looked last week, rather than a quarter century ago.
OK, obviously there's no population of "tigers" anywhere near Ozenkadnook or Goroke. But then ... what did Rilla actually see? More importantly, how did it get where it allegedly was? It could only have been a wanderer from some other place, a place where there is a refuge available, where families of such creatures might go unobserved
and unmolested for decades.
Let's recap what's required of a suitable haven for a population of relicts. The core area has to be relatively inaccessible, either because of its remoteness or because it's difficult to traverse. It has to have a supply of water and dense foliage for easy concealment and it has to provide a population of game animals for a carnivore to subsist upon. It has to be big enough to support, over many generations, a genetically viable population of such carnivores. Is there any such locality within striking distance of Goroke and Ozenkadnook?
Well, yes. There is the vast waste, about 14 to 15 thousand square kilometre's worth by my reckoning, of uninhabited scrublands known respectively as the Little Desert and Big Deserts in northwest Victoria. All right, the day is relatively young, the Green Machine is fuelled and ready to go, so ........ let's go!
Into the Little Desert.
By about 1:00PM we arrive at the edge of the Little Desert National Park.
We push on due north along a road as straight as a gun barrel. We pass by mile after mile of stunted gum trees and low lying scrub. We're looking for a 4WD track that's indicated further on: it should lead us into the interior.
We find the track, if you can call it that. It's not obvious at first but
directly it becomes a sandy path. We make a discovery : this is a National Park, but someone tried to farm here years ago. There's a wrecked house and abandoned machinery left lying about. There were two tractors left behind to block the road, the remains of wire fences and a loading ramp for trucks to take sheep away. Off in the scrub there were even graders and earth moving equipment. Just abandoned. We examine one machine - it was in good condition, once, but it's been out here a long time, 10 years, maybe more. What happened here? I sense some anonymous tale of lofty aspiration slapped down in defeat and despair and loss. There is a feeling of pathos and sadness about this place.
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But there were tracks, lots of them. The only disturbances to the ground have been made by animals. Of recent human visitation there is no trace. We follow the tracks - they were made by kangaroos but soon other tracks appear. Then more, and more. They're recent : last night there must have been a veritable menagerie passing by. They're not randomly criss-crossing, they all seem to be going somewhere ... let's follow on.
Now here's something interesting. A predator has made a kill. There are a few
tufts of brownish fur lying about and, see there, has the victim has been dragged along the ground by its killer? The predator has slender, curved claws : can't tell how many. But they don't look like a dog's claws, nor do they look feline. The prints look about 3 inches diameter. Yeah, I know : I should've had the plaster ready and a ruler. OK, I forgot about all that. I don't collect bags of turds and plaster casts anyway : the critics will always sneer at that stuff. Many of the well meaning souls who write in with witness reports go away disenchanted with my offhand attitude, as they see it. Well look, I'm on the track of some sort of beast : I don't know what it is but I already know the main localities where it manifests itself. Only a body or convincing video will settle the matter. That's how it is.
We follow the trail, soon it becomes an indecipherable jumble of tracks. It leads into an open, sandy area. And there are bones. Scores, hundreds of them, scattered about. It's a real charnel house. I look closer : they're sheep. It looks to me like, when the owners walked away, they abandoned a large flock of sheep along with the house and machinery and everything. Just walked away from the whole enterprise. Then, something came along and killed the sheep. They can't have starved - there's fodder and water in plentiful supply. I look closer. There are no bullet holes in any of the skulls. Usually, unwanted farm livestock are despatched with a bullet in the head. This flock was left behind then something came after and killed, and probably ate, them. Hundreds of'em : probably not all in one hit, probably in 5's and 6's over successive nights but it must have been a real massacre just the same. You can't help walking all over dry bones here, my boots make a crunching sound just walking along.
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The trail leads to an abandoned agricultural dam complex. There are abandoned siphon pipes left lying about : farmers use them to siphon out water onto a pasture or crop but I don't see any signs of cultivation. There are more bits of machinery lying about. And more bones, mostly scattered, a few lying in piles where the animal was killed. They're everywhere you look : an entire flock died here.
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There are game trails - let's hop in the car and follow on. They all seem to head for that line of scrub on the horizon. We reach the scrub and plunge on through. The going is easy at first but soon the trail fizzles out, the scrub closes in. You can't even open the car doors in this stuff. Can't even turn around either. Have to reverse all the way out and think this through.
Conclusions?
This scrubland is a good spot for our enterprise. Potentially, a very good spot, I'd say. But the abandoned farm lies on its periphery and we haven't even seen below the surface of this wilderness yet. To penetrate into the heart of this wasteland is gonna need a week long trip all on it's own. Obviously we'll have to be prepared to camp out nights here in this spooky desolation. But IF a last surviving tribe of Rilla's Critters exists, this is the only place they could be. Stay tuned - we'll be back.
