[5] The single specimen forwarded to Gould was presented to the Linnean Society of London, and the partial skull and skin of a female was deposited in the British Museum of Natural History.

[6] Curator and collector Hedley H. Finlayson described the remains of a potoroine animal found in a South Australian cave, which were similar to the Potorous platyops.

The skull that was studied and was held at a South Australian museum, amongst a deposit of multiple taxa from Kelly's Hill Caves, which was collected by A.M. Morgan.

[7][5] Comparison of the dentition and other morphological characteristics was limited to works published by G. R. Waterhouse (1846), Oldfield Thomas (1888) and B. Arthur Bensley (1903) whose descriptions of P. platyops are recorded at the BMNH.

[14] Their noses are short and blunt, which is an unusual characteristic among potorines and is usually associated with species such as the rufous bettong (Aepyprymnus rufescens) and the desert rat-kangaroo (Caloprymnus campestris).

The scant record of its habitat includes those provided by John Gilbert's informants, one of whom said, "All I could glean of its habits was that it was killed in a thicket surrounding one of the salt lagoons in the interior".

The information he reported—assumed to be from Nyungar informants—was that the species became extinct in 1905, were similar to the quokka in range and habits, and had been commonly found and often captured in large quantities.

Another set of bones were found in an midden beneath a large peppermint (Agonis flexuosa), which was assumed to be the feeding roost of a predatory bird such as an owl.

This site, near Hunter River, was partly preserved by a sand dune and included species introduced after the colonisation of Australia, possibly placing the date of these remains within recent history.

[18][6] Sub-fossil remains identified as P. platyops were also found in a survey of deposits on the Eyre Peninsula, accumulations that may have been middens of pre-colonial peoples of the region.

[16][6] Some evidence indicates that P. platyops, like the desert-dwelling rat-kangaroo (Caloprymnus campestris), was already in decline when the invasive European rabbit became established in the species' former range.