Parts of the skeleton of an ancient three-tonne wombat – which became extinct about 25,000 years ago – will be on display in the boardroom of the Glen Innes and District Services Club throughout Minerama.
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The Australian Museum described the megafauna Diprotodon optatum, from the Pleistocene of Australia, as the largest marsupial known and the last of the extinct, herbivorous diprotodontids.
They were around 3.8m long from head to tail and 1.7m at the shoulder and believed to be widespread across Australia when the first indigenous people arrived.
Glen Innes Severn Council tourism and event manager Peter Teschner said an incomplete ulna of Diprotodon was discovered at Reddestone Creek, north-west of Glen Innes some years ago.
That was the inspiration behind the decision to collaborate with the University of New England Paleontology, Geoscience and Earth History Units to set up a display for the duration of Minerama.
The display will feature a range of fossils, bones, skulls, rocks and marine and land specimens.
A paper by Bruce Runnegar – Department of Geology, University of New England – in 1981 indicated the ulna, or leg bone, from Reddestone Creek had deep cuts on opposite sides of the shaft.
“These marks are attributed to Thylacoleo carnifex because some of the cuts were made by blade-like teeth at least 2cm in length,” he said in the paper.
The Thylacoleo carnifex was a 1.5m carnivorous mammal – that looked like a cross between what could only be described as a large cat and a killer possum!
