At some point in the past, black-tailed jackrabbits (Lepus californicus) and snowshoe hares (L. americanus) crossbred, with the hybrids mating again with snowshoe hares. A combination of whole-genome and whole-exome sequencing revealed that the resultant hares retained a variation of the Agouti gene that led to brown, rather than white, coat color in hare populations experiencing mild, less snowy winters, allowing them to better blend into the drab surroundings of dirt and dead leaves.
A genetic analysis of a rare skull found at the Natural History Museum of Denmark showed that in the past few decades a male beluga (Delphinapterus leucas) and a female narwhal (Monodon monoceros) mated, creating a hybrid called a narluga that looked a bit like both. The animal’s 18 teeth were small, like a beluga’s, and twisted, like a narwhal’s tusk. Those teeth may have changed the way the narluga fed, not hunting on cod, squid, ...
