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A new species of living great ape!
Topic Started: Nov 2 2017, 12:05 PM (1,148 Views)
LittleLazyLass
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Well, if you're mixing up all the gene pools you're mingling the different populations and killing diversity. That said, mixed tigers are better than extinct ones.

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The fact that Borneans and Sumatrans produce viable, fertile hybrids should be enough to tell us that this level of crossbreeding is okay. But then I suppose there's the argument that these two orangutans are as molecularly different as lions and tigers (where the hybrid difference is far more notable) but I've always doubted these claims due to the fertility of the Orangutan hybrids.

The whole idea of equating [sub]specific or generic splits to the interbreed/fertility thing doesn't really hold up nowadays. Hell, chickens can breed with guineafowl, and they're not even in the same Linnaean family. Cougars and leopards are also capable of breeding, despite being as distant as two felids can be. Female hybrids between various Panthera species are fertile, and in certain cases males can be too. There's even hybrids born of two Panthera hybrid parents (one of those hybrid parents is a kind that has, to my understanding, been documented wild, too). Does this mean all panthers are a single species now? Snow leopards can interbreed with anything, but they're right smack in the middle of ones who can, so they'd get pulled in anyway.
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Lowry
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So would increasingly inbred separate communities be considered more 'diverse' than a Zoomix population? Surely at a point numbers within a community would become so low that inbreeding is super frequent and leads to evolutionary stagnation and poorer diversity
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Tartarus
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Great discovery. I hope people can avoid wiping this species out, as it would be quite a tragedy if a species were to go extinct not so long after it was discovered.

opeFool
 
Why don't people like crossbreeds? They're still the same species of animal, no?
If you are referring to interspecies hybrids then no they are not still the same species of animal but a mix between two separate species. And the reason people aren't too fond of this in conservation is because such hybrids are usually sterile. This is a big problem if you want an endangered or critically endangered species to increase its numbers through breeding. If they do too much interbreeding with other species this will create many sterile hyrbids that will be unable to continue their lineage and this will have a negative impact on the replenishing of the population.
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Ebervalius
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lamna
Nov 2 2017, 06:30 PM
It's unfortunate people only seem to actually try to accept hybrids until you're literally down to very last individuals.
Wait, this sounds contradictory. I think I don't quite get what you're saying, Lamna.
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Archeoraptor
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does inbreedign affect certainanimals more than others?in humansaa lot but what bout other primates?
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IIGSY
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May only be semi relevant, but hybrids are severely frowned upon my tarantula keepers.
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Flisch
Nov 2 2017, 02:53 PM
LittleWitch
Nov 2 2017, 01:56 PM
Well, this is technically elevating a known population to species status, but cool nonetheless.
Ah, I was confused about this. The title made it sound as if these are newly discovered. *glares at beetle*
Hey, the title technically isn’t incorrect. I only said there that it was a new species, which it is. I didn’t specify anything more than that, so don’t blame me for jumping to conclusions. ;)
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Flisch
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LittleWitch
Nov 2 2017, 07:06 PM
Well, if you're mixing up all the gene pools you're mingling the different populations and killing diversity.

No you don't. A larger genepool also means a more varied one. If you only breed people with red hair with one another, they will be much closer to one another and the genepool lacking in genetic diversity. But let them breed with all humans on the planet and you get the full spectrum of genes, including other colours of hair.

Hybridizing does not "remove" genes from the gene pool. Genes are only removed through extinction, which you know, happens when a highly inbred population can't keep up with environmental change and diseases. However, a genotype introduced into a genepool will stay there forever (unless it is unfit for survival, in which case it would die out anyway), with the accompanying phenotype resurfacing whenever the conditions are right.

opeFool
Nov 2 2017, 06:37 PM
Why don't people like crossbreeds? They're still the same species of animal, no?

Because different people have different ideas of what conservation means. The leading idea among the big aka popular conservation societies is to keep the status quo. Humans think the snapshot they experienced in this fleeting moment of natural history must be preserved at all costs, rather than making sure that ecologies are robust and stable. This basically means that populations that are separate simply due to recent geological barriers (like, say, rising sea levels due to the end of the ice age) must be kept separate forever.

As you can tell, I don't buy into that ideology at all. Nature is at its best when it is evolving. Its natural fluidity and flexibility is why life clings to, well, itself despite everything the universe has thrown at it. We should not try to stop it, we should offer a guiding hand as for the first time in the entire history of life, it gained the ability to understand itself.
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lamna
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Ebervalius
Nov 2 2017, 08:28 PM
lamna
Nov 2 2017, 06:30 PM
It's unfortunate people only seem to actually try to accept hybrids until you're literally down to very last individuals.
Wait, this sounds contradictory. I think I don't quite get what you're saying, Lamna.
Look at the Northern White Rhino, two old ladies who can't are likely too old to breed and a old bull. The two ladies being the bull's daughter and granddaughter.

Only now, when you're down to one animal capable of breeding do people consider hybridising them with the comparatively common Southern White Rhino. Something that if done earlier, could have created a healthy hybrid population with a large percentage of northern genetics. Now even if the bull does breed with southern rhinos, it's gonna be a minimal contribution in the long term.
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Flisch
Nov 3 2017, 03:34 AM
LittleWitch
Nov 2 2017, 07:06 PM
Well, if you're mixing up all the gene pools you're mingling the different populations and killing diversity.

No you don't. A larger genepool also means a more varied one. If you only breed people with red hair with one another, they will be much closer to one another and the genepool lacking in genetic diversity. But let them breed with all humans on the planet and you get the full spectrum of genes, including other colours of hair.

Hybridizing does not "remove" genes from the gene pool. Genes are only removed through extinction, which you know, happens when a highly inbred population can't keep up with environmental change and diseases. However, a genotype introduced into a genepool will stay there forever
wasn't this called swamping?
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Flisch
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Rodlox
Nov 3 2017, 04:56 AM
Flisch
Nov 3 2017, 03:34 AM
LittleWitch
Nov 2 2017, 07:06 PM
Well, if you're mixing up all the gene pools you're mingling the different populations and killing diversity.

No you don't. A larger genepool also means a more varied one. If you only breed people with red hair with one another, they will be much closer to one another and the genepool lacking in genetic diversity. But let them breed with all humans on the planet and you get the full spectrum of genes, including other colours of hair.

Hybridizing does not "remove" genes from the gene pool. Genes are only removed through extinction, which you know, happens when a highly inbred population can't keep up with environmental change and diseases. However, a genotype introduced into a genepool will stay there forever
wasn't this called swamping?
Apparently that's a term for it yes, but I don't see the relevance.
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Datura
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Nov 2 2017, 08:38 PM
May only be semi relevant, but hybrids are severely frowned upon my tarantula keepers.
This is pretty common among such communities. I was looking for info on hybrid corys because my little sister's catfish laid an egg, that was most likely a hybrid, but all I found was shit like "HURP DURP DAE HYBRIDS ARE RUBBISH?".

I seriously want to create a fertile line of hybrids just to watch people with this mentality burn. I bet I could pull off a butterfly hybrid.
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LittleLazyLass
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Proud quilt in a bag

My point is, if you breed x subspecies with y subspecies without taking care of who's what, you could eventually start to kill of one of them as a distinct entity as it merges into the other. Look at barbary lions, they have descendants, but no pure ones still exist, so everybody agrees they're extinct. Hence, you reduced lion diversity. Again, after a point this leads to inbreeding, but to a point trying to keep different populations distinct is a good thing. Additionally, the argument for making this distinct seems pretty strong to me (source one is the paper, by the way):

Wikipedia
 
Genetic comparisons show that Tapanuli orangutans diverged from Sumatran orangutans about 3.4 million years ago,[1][5][7] but became more isolated after the Lake Toba eruption which occurred about 75,000 years ago. They had continued sporadic contact that stopped at least 10,000 to 20,000 years ago. In contrast, Sumatran orangutans diverged from Bornean orangutans about 670,000 years ago.

Genetics are what's important here, but there is a noticeable different physically as well:

Wikipedia
 
However, it has been observed that they have frizzier hair and smaller heads.[7][8] Male Tapanuli orangutans produce long mating calls which are distinct from those of other orangutan species.[4][7] Their diet is also unique, containing items like caterpillars and conifer cones.[9]

While I'm here, I found this interesting as well:

Wikipedia
 
Tapanuli orangutans are separated from the island's other species of orangutan, the Sumatran orangutan, by only 100 kilometres (62 mi).[5]

Fascinating two populations can remain measurably distinct for sure a long time despite being so close together. Since it's relevant, here's one last quote:

Wikipedia
 
Inbreeding depression is likely due to the small population size and fragmented range, and signs of inbreeding are apparent.[1]
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lamna
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I'm not suggesting we actively try and create hybrids when they are not needed.

But when you've got five subspecies, each with less than 100 individuals, it might be better to create one healthy population, rather than have two go extinct and three be terribly inbred.
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Lowry
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LittleWitch
Nov 3 2017, 10:44 AM
Look at barbary lions, they have descendants, but no pure ones still exist, so everybody agrees they're extinct.
Again I think this wholly depends on your perception on conservation as a concept. To me, the fact that there are no more pure Barbary lions, but their genetics are carried on is more positive than the rapid decline of populations towards incestuous ends and then extinction. I can see the argument that if it wasn't for human meddling etc etc, that these species may survive and we're influencing their chances of survival, but honestly a part of me just says 'yeh and?', the human caused holocene extinction event is just as unfair as any other extinction event and so I don't see why we kick up such a fuss over the fact that we cause it. Yes we are destroying ecosystems and killing off our planets biodiversity but in the end isn't that why we're an extinction event in the first place?

I'm not saying that I am morally okay with deforestation, habitat loss etc, I'm certainly not, but a part of me can't help but look at the global ecosystem and go 'Yeah, nature has been given extinction events of this scale (if not worse) before and bounced back, why should I be bothered that certain organisms in particular, just by luck of the geographical draw and their lack of tenacity to adapt to man-made habitats, aren't gonna make it through this extinction. It is the same as any other extinction event before it and I believe inevitable that it will continue.
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