You've most likely heard about hybrid animal species. But did you know that there are lots of hybrid creatures all over the place?
Some of these hybrid creatures occur naturally, but the majority are the result of human intervention and selective breeding.
What exactly is a hybrid animal..?
Species are groupings of living creatures that are related enough to exchange DNA or interbreed. A hybrid animal, on the other hand, is born when parents from two distinct (though generally highly closely related) species can have offspring.
Although there are a few exceptions, hybrid offspring of two distinct species are normally sterile and unable to reproduce. It is possible to create a breeding line of fertile hybridized animals with scientific intervention and specific breeding techniques (including artificial insemination).
well, let's take a look at 10 such rare, scary and beautiful hybrid animals.
1. Liger
(Male tiger & female lion)
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| (Image © - crownridgetigers.com) |
The liger is the biggest feline living today, weighing up to 420 kg. It is a combination of a male lion and a female tiger. They have brown fur with subtle striped patterns that fade away in various spots. Ligers are not known to occur in the wild (since their parents' habitats do not coincide) and have only been spotted in captivity where they have been carefully bred.
2. Tigon
(Male lion & female tiger)
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| (Image © - techeblog.com) |
A tigon is the offspring of a male tiger and a female lion. The body of a tigon is light brown with stripes and a white underbelly, and it has a huge mane and spotted head. Since they are mostly infertile, tigons only exist in captivity as part of breeding projects (though there have been several notable exceptions).
3. Jaglion
(Male jaguar & female lion)
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| (Image © - From Twitter @racionalistaweb) |
These rare hybrid large cats are known as 'jaglions,' and only two are known to exist. Jahzara and Tsunami are naturally born siblings of a male jaguar and a female lion bred in the same zoo, and they currently reside at Bear Creek Wildlife Sanctuary in Ontario, Canada.
4. Leopon
(Male leopard & female lion)
The leopon is an extremely rare cross between a male leopard and a lioness that has never been seen outside of captivity. The leopon resembles a mythical beast, with the head of a lion and the body of a leopard. The first leopon was made in India in 1910, and it is estimated that just approximately 100 remain in the world today.
5. Cheetoh
(Bengal cat & Ocicat)
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| (Image © - petguide.com) |
The cheetoh was created in 2001 by a breeder who wanted to produce a new feline with the morphological traits of a wild cat and the kindness of a domestic cat. They succeeded, and the cheetah now has a beautiful, velvety coat that resembles a little leopard or cheetah, with small rosettes or spots in brown, gold, and cinnamon hues. Cheetohs are one of the most common domestic cat breeds, yet hybrids are very unusual.
6. Grolar bear
(Polar bear & brown bear)
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| (Image © - sierraclub.org) |
These remarkable hybrid apex predators, which combine grizzly and polar bears, are also known as polar Grizz, polizzle, pizzly bear, grizzlar, or nanulakm. They are relatively uncommon in that they are more commonly seen in the wild than in zoos.
A strange-looking bear that was shot on Banks Island in the Canadian Arctic provided the DNA evidence for the first verified sighting of a grolar, which occurred in 2006. It's possible that polar bears and brown bears are interacting more in the wild due to climate change, leading to an increase in their sharing of overlapping regions.
7. Coywolf
(Coyote & wolf)
Coyotes and wolves just started diverging from one another around 200,000 years ago, and the two species are still able to mate and give birth to coywolves, who are healthy offspring. Coywolves are between the size of a coyote and a wolf when fully grown, and they exhibit numerous traits from both of their parents. It is unknown whether coywolves are creatures that form lifelong partnerships, like both of their parent species do.
8. Beefalo
(Buffalo & cow)
Beefalo are the progeny of domestic cattle and American bison that have been fertilized (known as buffalo). The earliest crossings between these two species are considered to have happened some 250 years ago, with purposeful crossbreeding beginning in the nineteenth century.
The beefalo was intended to combine the finest qualities of both species to boost beef production, but it has regrettably resulted in a significant setback to wild American bison conservation, with wild bison populations getting tainted with cow DNA.
9. Dzo
(Cow & wild yak)
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| (Image © - safarisafricana.com) |
The dzo is a male hybrid of a yak and a domestic cow that originated on the high plateaus of Mongolia and Tibet. Male hybrids are normally infertile, while the female hybrid, known as a dzomo or zhom, is fertile. These hybrids are bigger and stronger than cows and yaks, and they are appreciated for their meat and milk production.
10. Zubron
(Cow & European bison)
Zubron was created by breeding domestic cattle with European bison to create a new breed of domestic cattle that was bigger, stronger, and more disease resistant.
Zubron is an extraordinarily huge hybrid capable of withstanding hard winters, with males reaching up to 1,200 kilograms. The first zubrons were produced in 1847, but the effort failed for a variety of reasons, leaving just a tiny herd roaming freely in Poland's Bialowieski National Park.
(Source: safarisafricana.com)
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