Why is cross-breeding with feral dogs considered part of endangering a species?
In my opinion it has been for quite awhile now that cross-breeding with feral dogs should not be considered when looking at how or why an animal is endangered. If that is the only reason numbers are declining, I don't think it should be marked as an endangered species. This is not including animals purposefully bred to wolves or dingos to produce hybrids as pets - I by no means support hybrids as pets, only as they exist in the wild. Animals live and choose by selection to pass on their genes to whomever they consider a worthy mate - if feral dogs are more successful in Ethiopia, it would be natural for an Ethiopian wolf to choose the dog as its mate versus another wolf who was doing poorly. The same situation can be applied to dingos and North American wolves. Species eventually move on and plenty of animals don't even look the same today that they did 100 years ago - the negative affects of those animals breeding with the dogs is that in doing so they may become less wary of humans and become harmful to the communities that they live close to, but as for the wolves interbreeding with the dogs at all, that's just a species moving on. Would we call a variant of a particular bird species, say, a blue jay with a slightly lower crest than average, endangered and protect it if for some reason higher crests would advance the species and improve their chances of survival? In one hundred years as far as we know, blue jays could have considerably higher crests, but protecting those with lower crests and preventing them from accessing the gene giving them higher crests would simply cause them to lose their ability to survive as well as the higher crested blue jays. Since that's a bit smaller scale, I'll give a larger scale example. Horses. If two separate horse herds developed in Mongolia over time, forming two different species, and then began interbreeding, would they both be considered endangered and prevented from breeding in order to save the two separate species? Or would it be allowed to continue on the pretense that the two horse breeds interbreeding actually gave them an advantage in their environment that the two separate breeds would not have? Not that an entirely new species could be formed, but there could be changes to the species. The number of dingo populations are described noting only "pure" populations of dingos. However, few species should be considered completely pure. There are variations within every species, and because of those variations species may be allowed to advance, separate into completely new populations and so on, depending of course on environmental or other conditions. A species is defined using specific traits, and subspecies are decided amongst one another as using only a few different traits. Dogs, dingos, and most wolves are all of the genus Canis. Dogs, dingos, and most wolves are all of the same species, lupus. They are then defined as subspecies - dogs, Canis lupus familiaris, dingos, Canis lupus dingo, and wolves, Canis lupus lupus. The only separate species mentioned is the Ethiopian wolf, Canis simensis. However, even different species may be noted as having bred with each other, Canis rufus, the red wolf, and Canis latrans, the coyote, as well as various types of jackal and so on. If a wolf breeds with a coyote, it may be noted that perhaps smaller animals are doing better within the region than larger animals, and it would be to the wolf's benefit, or rather, the benefit of its offspring, that the parent would breed with a coyote rather than another pure wolf. Breeding with another so called pure wolf would mean that the offspring would still be rather large as opposed to shrinking slightly as they would with a coyote parent, and be denied the advantage of a smaller species. So, after all this. Why would an animal of the Canis genus be considered endangered and then protected against cross-breeding with feral dogs if it might benefit the species overall? Yes, it is an opinion that cross-breeding with feral dogs shouldn't be considered endangering a species. It's shortened in the question. The long stuff is a bunch of examples. And I am not talking about any particular case, it does not focus on any case. It is a general question.
Zoology - 8 Answers
Random Answers, Critics, Comments, Opinions :
1 :
You lost me after, "In my opinion..."
2 :
TL:DR
3 :
I don't understand, are you talking about the Coyotes coming eastward who have bred with Yellowstone wolves and are much larger than western Coyotes
4 :
Yeaaah --- what? I really didn't bother reading that. Try rephrasing it so that people don't get turned off by the length.
5 :
Yikes. I'm not in the business of deciding what canines get to mount other canines. You seem impassioned by the matter. I suppose I would agree that imposing man's will upon nature is sometimes ridiculous. I suspect it all comes down to that fact that sometimes man has too much time on his hands. Don't forget that much of our "science" is motivated by ideology and grants.
6 :
To restate your question simply- you don't see genetic purity as important when trying to conserve a species. Part of your question also seems to be why conserve sub-populations when you have plenty of a species overall (you include domestic individuals as equal to wild individuals in your example). Genetic diversity is actually LOST not GAINED when hybrids are created. The argument that introducing foreign DNA improves the diversity of a species is flawed. A dog/wolf is not a wolf genetically, behaviorally, or physically, despite a possible superficial resemblance, and cannot replace a wild population of a genetically distinct sub species. The label "Species" is messy and human imposed for the purposes of classification, biology isn't as simple as saying anything that can interbreed and produce viable offspring is a species, with all members equal. When do you say two distinct populations are now officially different enough to be separate species, and now deserve to be protected? It is far better to look at genetic diversity when making decisions about conservation of populations, rather than classifying a teacup poodle as the genetic equal of a genetically pure dingo or wolf.
7 :
Every time a purebred wolf (for example) breeds with another related species that is not its exact species, the percentage of their wolf blood is sliced in half. Doing so creates hybrids. In the southern states, there used to be many red wolves. But they began to breed with coyotes because not enough of their species were available in their area to breed with. Thus, hybrids were created. I do agree, that if something breeds with a mate is healthy but not the same species, then it is okay, because the offspring will most likely do well. In some cases, the offspring will not be able to reproduce, though, as in the case of the liger, and there will not be a third generation. The entire point of a healthy mate would be destroyed. I think it is mostly humans who are to blame for endangered species. In Florida, red wolves were hunted so much, that the animals had no other wolves of their species to mate with, and so turned to another similar species. The offspring, no longer being purebred, are not to be considered a red wolf, although they may have many similarities. Then that hybrid breeds with another hybrid, whose offspring breed with other hybrids, until there are almost not any red wolves left. In 1983, the last recorded purebred red wolf in in Florida was shot, and then a few years later the last recorded hybrid in Florida was shot as well.Other times, it could be confusion. Some animals may mistake another animal for its species. For example, a coyote does not know what it looks like, and it could spot a wolf that it thinks is its species, and mate with it. But in the end, we really have ourselves to blame for extinction. Of course, we can't forget the dodo birds, right? If we had more respect towards the animals, we would not kill them for the fun of it, eat them, or tease them. And they should only be in captivity if being rehabbed or for captive breeding, and that the offspring along with their parents are released to the wild.
8 :
Hybridizations between different species are rare, but they do occur. For example, coyotes and wolves have been hybridizing for a long time, and yet each species have maintained their distinctness because of the relative rarity of hybrids. Neither species is endangered by the hybridization events. However, when a species is already endangered, the number of individuals are naturally small. Hybridization between an endangered species and a more common one would further dilute the gene pool of the endangered animal, perhaps to the point that it may no longer persist as a distinct species. Remember, a species is defined as a group of populations that interbeed with one another. If an endangered species is interbreeding freely with another species, then the endangered species is no longer able to maintain its distinctness as a species. It is in effect become part of another species, and it is therefore on the way to extinction.
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