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To: Elsie
Today's biologists tend to disagree; especially in the case of the cheetah. They say there's not ENOUGH 'diversity' in the cute cat's gene pool.

I've read that cheetahs are all so genetically close that they're almost clones. The theory is that the cheetah population once fell to maybe one pregnant female due to a drought or some sort of natural disaster.

So, cheetahs are pretty inbred. Their genetic pool is incredibly shallow.

418 posted on 03/23/2005 7:27:14 AM PST by Modernman ("They're not people, they're hippies!"- Cartman)
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To: Modernman
So, cheetahs are pretty inbred. Their genetic pool is incredibly shallow.

Sexual reproduction offers a buffer against environmental change by allowing a species to carry a lot of tested, non-lethal variation in its genome.

425 posted on 03/23/2005 8:07:21 AM PST by js1138
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