New research shows the now-extinct Tasmanian tiger lived until the 1980s. Click to read more. Tasmanian tigers once roamed mainland Australia and as far as the island of New Guinea in the north until it was only confined in Australia's island state of Tasmania Officially known as the Tasmanian wolf or the thylacine (Thylacinus cynocephalus), the last remaining member of the carnivorous marsupial was long thought to have died in 1936, mainly caused by anthropogenic extinction.