Other Animal (But Non-Buggy) Crackers

Previous legend || Other Animal (But Non-Buggy) Crackers || Next legend

No title

Impossible: Cats and rabbits hybridize to produce "cabbits".

Occasionally people will claim that Manx cats are the product of a rabbit/cat cross. Manx are tailless cats which often have a rabbit-like (hopping) gait, and really do like rather rabbit-like; both conditions arise from a spinal cord defect, and therefore Manx-like cats can appear spontaneously, through mutation, as well as by breeding. Reference: Mater Med Pol. 1987 Oct-Dec;19(4):219-21. The Manx cat: an animal model for neural tube defects. Green ST, Green FA.

Documented: Some species do hybridize and even produce fertile offspring.

Mules are a well-known example of cross-species hybridization; they're the (sterile) offspring of a horse and a donkey. However, some animals that are clearly of different species can breed and actually produce fertile offspring; the Gaboon viper and rhinoceros viper, for instance, interbreed regularly in the wild, and several species of snakes have been hybridized in captivity and produced fertile offspring. Southwestern North America has several all-female species of whiptail lizards that reproduce by parthenogenesis; it's thought that these species may originate as semi-sterile hybrids of other species. The Bengal breed of domestic cat is the result of crossing the wild Asian leopard cat with domestic cats.

Cats and rabbits, however, are far too distantly related to have the remotest chance of compatible chromosomes.

Cites:

Mehrtens, John M. Living Snakes of the World: In Color. Sterling Publications, 1987.

McEachern, Michael. A Color Guide to Corn Snakes Captive-Bred in the United States. Advanced Vivarium Systems (Lakeside, CA), 1991.

Cole, C. J., H. C. Dessauer, and G. F. Barrowclough. 1988. Hybrid origin of a unisexual species of whiptail lizard, Cnemidophorus neomexicanus, in western North America: New evidence and a review. American Museum Novitates 2905, 1-38.

Johnson, G. Getting to Know the Bengal Cat. Gogees Cattery (Denham Springs, LA).