Animals like to get freaky, and as it turns out, sometimes they like to get freaky with
other species.
Now the internet is filled with fake hybrid animals like shark birds, crocodile frogs
and rhinoceros cocks, but in this video we’re looking at real hybrid animals.
From Zebroids to Wolphins, join us as we count 10 extremely weird hybrid animals
Mules and Hinnies Mules and Hinnies are probably the most common
hybrids and are used for their reliability and strength in a smaller size than a purebred
horse.
And yet, they are actually rather difficult to obtain, since horses have 2 more chromosomes
than donkeys.
This makes male mules and hinnies sterile meaning they cannot reproduce.
Zebroids The term “Zebroid” is quite a broad one
in the sense that while it always involves a zebra, the other party can be pretty much
anything as long as they’re in the horse family.
Other names for other combinations include but are not limited to zorses, zonies, zonkeys,
zeedonks, and apparently even zombies.
As it turns out we’ve had it all wrong, they’re not undead humans seeking living
flesh, they are simply the hybrid results of a zebra and a very unfortunate human.
OK maybe I made that last bit up.
I should be sorry, but I’m not.
Narwhal-beluga hybrid A Narwhal is a medium sized toothed whale
that possesses a large tusk from a protruding canine tooth.
It is one of two living species of whale in the Monodontidae family, along with the beluga
whale.
A beluga whale is similarly sized as a narwhal but does not have the protruding tusk.
As rare as they are, there have been documented cases of hybrids, such as one that was found
in west Greenland and a stranded example found on San Juan Island in 2011.
This is another example of hybridization that may become more common due to global warming
interfering with the species’ natural habitats.
Sheep-goats Guess what this is a cross between?
Wrong, it’s a cross between Iron Man and a Nacho.
Actually your guess was correct.
Despite looking somewhat similar, it’s not easy to mate sheeps and goats since they belong
to different gene families and they have a different number of chromosomes.
That being said, it has happened.
At the Botswana Ministry of Agriculture in 2000, a male sheep impregnated a female goat
resulting in a live offspring.
This hybrid had 57 chromosomes.
Since then there have been a few more examples, but not many.
Ligers Ligers are the result of a male lion and a
female tiger mating, and they only exist in captivity since the habitats of their parental
species do not overlap in the wild.
Ligers are the largest of all living cats, and have characteristics from both parents.
For example, they like to swim like tigers and they are very sociable, like lions.
Interestingly, Ligers can grow to be larger than either parent species, something that
separates them from Tigons which you guessed it, is the result of a male tiger and female
lion.
So how big you ask?
Well, they can grow to be over 3 metres long and can weigh more than 300 kilos.
That makes them weigh more than the average grizzly bear.
Camas A cama is a hybrid between a male dromedary
camel and a female llama, and has been produced via artificial insemination at the Camel Reproduction
Centre in Dubai.
The first ever Cama was born in 1998.
The purpose of their existence is basically to combine the best of both worlds.
They wanted to get a higher wool production, with the size and strength of a camel but
with a more co-operative temper.
Since an adult dromedary camel can weigh up to six times as much as a llama, the hybrid
needs to be produced via artificial insemination so you’re not likely to see any camas strutting
around in the wild.
Savannah cats A Savannah cat is a hybrid cat breed that
is cross between a serval and a domestic cat.
The first ever Savannah cat was bred in 1986 by a Bengal breeder named Judee Frank.
Since then it has become incredibly popular with breeders and in 2001 it became registered
as a new official breed.
Savannah cats have tall slim builds which gives them the appearance of size when their
actual weight does not reflect this.
Savannahs are more social than typical domestic cats and they’re very trainable so they
can often be compared more to dogs than cats.
Beefalo The origins of beefalo are rather sad since
their pure existence has come about to improve beef production by combining the best characteristics
of domestic cattle and bison.
They’ve been around for quite a while, with accidental crosses being spotted as far back
as 1749, but they were first intentionally bred during the mid-19th century.
While breeding cattle and bison have proved effective in producing better beef with lower
fat and cholesterol, it has had a negative effect on bison conservation since most current
bison herds are genetically polluted in some form by cattle.
Wholphins A Wholphin is an extremely rare hybrid animal
born from mating a common bottlenose dolphin and a false killer whale.
There is currently only 1 example of a Wholphin in captivity which can be found at Sea Life
Park in Hawaii, but they have been known to exist in the wild as well.
A Wholphin will hold characteristics right in the middle between the parents, whether
that be relating to size, shape, colour or even the number of their teeth, with a bottlenose
dolphin having 88 teeth, a false killer whale having 44 teeth and a wholphin having 66.
Grolar bears One of the few hybrid animals on this list
to actually occur in the wild, Grolar Bears are huge and scary.
Interestingly, the first hybrid animal discovered in the wild was as recently as 2006, when
a hunter from Idaho shot what he believed to be a polar bear.
Officials examined the creature and noted that while it had some polar bear-like qualities,
it also had some grizzly bear-like qualities.
If the creature turned out to be a grizzly bear the hunter would have faced a fine and
up to 1 year in prison.
Fortunately for him it turned out to be a Grolar bear.
There’s a good chance Grolar bears well become more and more frequent as global warming
starts destroying the polar bear’s natural habitat.