The phenomena of increased species interbreeding, as a result of climate change impact on the habitat, became a
subject of discussions and different points of view among scientists.
The eastern coyote,
for example, is a wolf-coyote hybrid that has expanded its range across the
eastern US and Canada. Scientists have discovered that these super-sized
coyotes are only about two-thirds coyote.
About 10 percent of their genes
belong to domestic dogs and a quarter comes from wolves, with which they
hybridized as they moved east north of the Great Lakes. Hybridization enabled
eastern coyotes to adapt quickly to fill the niche left by wolves.
There are also other
examples of hybridization - polar bears mate with grizzlies in the Canadian
Arctic, stocked rainbow trout crosses with native cutthroat trout in the U.S.
West, southern flying squirrels hybridize with northern flying squirrels, and
so on…
Some scientists
consider hybridization as a major problem, even as “a nightmare of our time”, which
may cause biodiversity losses. Others see interbreeding as driver of evolution,
that threatens some species but enables others to survive and
prosper. Who is right?... Read
more at http://www.pri.org/
