Six amazing hybrid animals (pretty neat critters)

Yahoo ^ | 4.27.10 | Bryan Nelson

[DemforBush]

Ligers, tigons and grolar bears, oh my! Take a look at some of these otherworldly hybrid animals and you'll realize the possibilities are endless.

Though they rarely occur in nature, individuals from different but closely related species do occasionally mate, and the result is a biological hybrid — an offspring that shares traits from both parent species. You may have heard of the mysterious sheep-pig creature, but it turns out that one isn't a true hybrid.

Here are six bizarre, but truly unique half-breeds...

[DemforBush]

Pretty neat article, though you do have to filter out the enviro-cult angle a bit (the author writes for something called "Mother Nature Network").

BTW, I've had beefalo before, when I was a kid. I remember it being tasty. Then again, I love bison meat too.

[DemforBush]

BTW2, just to give you an idea at just how big a Liger can get:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=191cPadaxCk

Nice kitty, NICE KITTY!

[historyrepeatz]

[bert]

I snapped this in Wyoming. I think they call it a Jackalope

[Republic]

It was neat, but in a strange way kind of sad (maybe it was just the zonkey or perhaps, my attitude towards the gene pool messing around) but the article says lots of the mixes happen in nature, like the grizzly and the polar bear mix. They didn't include a coydog-which is a coyote-dog mix.

I also noted on the yahoo page that you could click on ten monogamous animals and loved it! The gibbons photo was so tender it just got to me, and it was so cool to learn that the American Bald Eagle is monogamous as well! Too cool. I did not know that swans were monogamous but do know that Canadian geese are (but were not mentioned in the given ten).

[cripplecreek]

I suspect that Cardinals (the bird) are monogamous. There is a single pair here in my yard year round and they’re never far apart.

[Doulos1]

The worst hybrid I’ve ever known is a heartless,
cruel Kenyan/whore offspring.

[PugetSoundSoldier]

A liger, did you say?

It's Napoleon Dynamite's favorite animal.

[martin_fierro]

[Joe 6-pack]

[buschbaby]

We raised 2 beefalo steers when I was a kid. Best beef I ever ate.

[wrench]

Used to own a beefalo. Good looking cow, and looked just like the other domestic cows till you stood them side by side. The beefalo stood at least 25% taller. She also had the curly buffalo type hair on her neck, and her gestation ran a good month longer than the domestic cows.

Hybrid animals are interesting. Even got to ride my mule today.

BTW, I think it is still illegal in Ga. to misrepresent a hinney as a mule during a sale.

[50mm]

[cripplecreek]

Its a Rheagle.

[50mm]

[ColdWater]

Some guy in Alaska shot what he thought was a polar bear but officials said no. DNA’d to NOT be a polar bear. Suspicion was that it was a Polar-Grizzley but he was in a lot of trouble.

[ConorMacNessa]

Much less repulsive than most of the HT pics I've seen posted on FR. Seems less incongruous attached to a bat body.

Lamh Foistenach Abu!

[Joe 6-pack]

[Republic]

I think that is so cool. I love nature and the way God designed it all...we watch Canadian geese who return each year to a creek that flows by my hsb’s mom’s house. Canadian geese make the best parents in the world (well maybe not as good as those rodents on the webpage at yahoo) but truly they work as a team and it is too fun to watch. The goslings PLAY with their parents-did you know that? When just born, mom of course, spreads her wings to cover them at night and for about a week or two at nap times as well. Sometimes they play under mom, with little heads popping up between her feathers at all angles, sometimes struggling to get up on top of her and doing a neck cuddle with her and it is something to see if ya happen to enjoy that kind of thing. I love it.

[50mm]