Tantanoola tiger

In 1884 near Tantanoola in South Australia's south east a Bengal tiger supposedly escaped from a travelling circus. A search was mounted, but the tiger was never found. Over the next few years, there were many reports of missing sheep in the area and some suggested that the sheep had become the prey of the missing tiger. Eleven years after the tiger went missing a local man, Tom Donovan, saw what he thought was the Bengal tiger in a paddock with a sheep in its jaws. He took a shot at it with his gun and shot the animal in the side. As it turns out, it was not a Bengal tiger, but a Eurasian wolf - equally out of place in the Australian environment. It is thought that the wolf was a stowaway on a boat that was shipwrecked off the coast, but managed to make it to the shore. The wolf was stuffed and is now on display at the Tantanoola Hotel. For fifteen years after the shooting of the wolf, however, sheep continued to go missing from the area. A policeman from Adelaide eventually went to investigate and arrested a local man for sheep stealing.