Reptile & Amphibian Forums

Hey, did anyone see the show Genetic Oddities on (I Think) the history channel?

Anyway, what I thought was cool was that this cat is a totally man made oddity and it cannot reproduce on its own because only the female Ligers are fertile.

What is really odd is that, to make a Liger, you need to breed a male lion to a female tiger. It wont be the same animal if you breed it the other way - the female lion to male tiger. What happens is that (normally)something genetic in the female lion prevents the male lions genes from totally taking over and making a huge-a-mongous animal. In the Liger, this female "genetic blocker" is no longer present and the Liger grows to like 12 feet long and is a monster. They get SO BIG sometimes that their feet & legs cant support them anymore. If you breed the female lion to the male tiger this "genetic blocker" is present and the animals size is normal.

Genetic tinkering - ya never know what yo gonna get - huh?

Does anyone have a link for this?????????????

Here's a link to a site which contains several hybrid cats ranging from Ligers to mammal and bird hybrids. Many of which I don't agree with and some which I think look rather cool.

www.messybeast.com/genetics/hybrid-cats.htm
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Phil Red Hernandez-

Thanks!!!

No problem.
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Phil Red Hernandez-

Ligers are bred for their skills in magic

Designer cat they are trying to get to look like a tiger.

http://www.toygers.org/about.html

Those are cool, they have a breed that looks like a leopard too. My wife wants to get a kitten before her 15yr old Mancoon dies, I'm trying to convince her to spend the extra and get something cool looking like that.
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1.0 pastel ball python
0.1 mojave ball python
0.1 normal ball python
0.2 3-toed box turtles
2.3 eastern box turtles
0.0.5 3-striped mud turtle
1.0 northern diamondback terrapin
2.1 tiger salamander
1.1 red-sided garter
1.0 anerythristic red-sided garter
1.1 Iowa snow plains garter
1.1 Het butter stripe cornsnake
0.1 anerythristic motley cornsnake

One of the other reasons they grow so large is that they are sterile. Because of this, they don't hit puberty, so they never stop they're prepubescent growth spurt.

Cool stuff.
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"What is man without the beasts?
If all the beasts were gone,
men would die from great loneliness of spirit.
For what happens to the beasts,
soon happens to men.
All things are connected."

-Chief Seattle (Duwamish Tribe)

for a guard animal at my house.
These Ligers would be perfect for taking care of rapists and child molesters!! (and liberal dems') woops just kidding!!

Mike
LIGER VIDEO

A little more detail.

Liger = Male Lion X Female Tiger. In Lions the growth inhibitor gene is in females, in Tigers it is in males. So with Ligers you miss it on both ends.

Tigon = Male Tiger X Female Lion.

Ligers get too massive to support their own bulk.

Actually there was a Liger that ended up being fertile and bred a Siberian Tiger, a real mix there. It was in a sanctuary somewhere in the US, I think in Cali. They didn't think it would be fertile, but low and behold, babies!
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Gilbert Boas
The Boa List!

Maybe it's just me but I find them disgusting. They should never be bred. Just because something can be done does not mean it should be. How many animals had to grow into deformed adults before they figured out how the breeding had to be done?
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John Vandegrift