Hybrid animals and the ability to reproduce...?

Question

I don't know much on this topic yet, but the first questions that come into my mind are:

What hybrid animals are able to reproduce and which ones don't ? examples. And why so ?

Answer 1

The reasons why most hybrids cannot reproduce has to do with chromosome numbers.  For example, horses have 64 chromsomes and donkeys have 62.  When each provides a gamete with its haploid number to make a mule, the mule ends up with 63.  When it's time for the mule to try to make its own gametes, the 32 horse chromosomes don't pair up easily with the 31 donkey chromosomes.  So, meiosis fails and no gametes are produced, making the mule sterile.

When hybrids are fertile, it is because the chromosomes are sufficiently similar that they can still pair during meiosis in the hybrid to make gametes.

Answer 2

<<What hybrid animals are able to reproduce and which ones don't ? examples. And why so ?>>

Occasionally, hybrids can reproduce.  Normally, for example, the hybrid offspring of horses and donkeys are infertile.  Occasionally, they aren't.  Therefore, stating which hybrid animals do reproduce wouldn't be all that reliable.  Hybrids of parents who were close enough related are more liable to be fertile.  That's a vague answer.  However, a more specific sounding one wouldn't necessarily be a better answer in this case.

Answer 3

Hybrids are not always born sterile, fertile crosses occur in some species depending on how different the species are from each other. Waterfowl are more prone to hybridization than other avian species. The Mallard has about 50 known possible crosses with other duck & geese species. In the wild Mallard (Anas platyrhynchos) and American Black Duck (Anas rubripes) hybrids have been found to be 8% to 13% of the tagged Mallard and Black Duck migrating populations.  "Though hybrids of kindred species, such as the Mallard and Black Duck, are usually fertile and the s*x ratio is normal, this is not the case with crosses between less closely related species." Mallard and pintail duck hybrids are rarely fertile.

This is taken from 'Ducks, Geese, and Swans of North America' by Francis H. Kortright

There are several closely related species of true parakeet that are able to cross. Ring-necked parakeets and Alexandrine parakeets are the most common species crossed in captivity. These crosses, unlike horse x donkey crosses, are sometimes fertile. Breeding for color variations is done with captive birds that would not normally meet and mate in the wild. But all such crosses that succeed are done between birds in a single genus so they are interspecific crosses (crosses between two species) not intergenic crosses (crosses between two genera).

http://home.wanadoo.nl/psittaculaworld/M...

Macaw hybrids

http://animal-world.com/encyclo/birds/ma...

Finch hybrids

http://www.lostmymarblz.com/fl-breeding-...

Sparrow hybrids are rare

http://www.sdnhm.org/research/birds/hybr...

Hare crosses produce fertile hybrids. Lepus europaeus crossed with another European hare Lepus timidus.

http://www.blackwell-synergy.com/doi/pdf...

White tail/mule deer hybrids & others

http://www.coueswhitetail.com/coues_biol...

http://www.messybeast.com/genetics/hybri...

http://www.genomnz.co.nz/Default.asp?Pag...

http://www3.interscience.wiley.com/journ...

Canid hybrids occur between coyotes, wolves, dingos, jackals and domestic dogs.

http://www.wildlifetech.com/pages/necoyo...

http://www.fmv.ulg.ac.be/genmol/Departme...

http://www.idir.net/~wolf2dog/wayne2.htm