The post This “Pizzly” Bear Is Real, and It’s Not Quite Polar or Grizzly appeared first on A-Z Animals.

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Quick Take

• A rare bear hybrid exists in the wild: polar bears and grizzlies can produce viable offspring, confirmed by DNA.

• It’s a sign of shifting overlap, not “a new species”: experts frame these bears as hybrids; the bigger story is changing ranges and conditions in the Arctic.

• Hybrids can look like a mash-up of both parents: mixed coat color and features show traits from each lineage—fueling the “pizzly/grolar” nickname debate.

If we were to list some of the most common animals, we might think of sharks, foxes, or dolphins. However, the world has plenty of hybrids. And they are just as unique and beautiful as the animals we know and love so well. For instance, the Clymene dolphin, pampas fox, or the Australian blacktip shark. Let’s get a little more information about this hybrid species of bear that is shown in the video above.

The World of Bears And Their Species

The YouTube video clip at the top of this blog post brings us into the world of bears to see a hybrid species. The Predator Wild YouTube channel shares this educational video with us. They offer a variety of instructional commentaries on animals such as the Komodo dragon, killer whale, king cobra, and alligators.

Meet the Hybrid Species of the Polar Bear and Grizzly Bear

According to Live Science, a hybrid species of the polar bear and grizzly bear is known as a pizzly bear. The mating of the polar and grizzly bears directly correlates to climate change. “As the world warms and Arctic sea ice thins, starving polar bears are being driven ever further south, where they meet grizzlies, whose ranges are expanding northwards.”

The Carnegie Museum of Natural History shares that scientists discovered in 2006 that these two bears would often breed together. And their names would either go by pizzlies or grolar bears. If a male polar bear mated with a female grizzly bear, it would be referred to as a pizzly. And if a male grizzly bear mated with a female polar bear, it would be called a grolar bear.

How Big Are Pizzly Bears?

Let’s first dive into the size of the pizzly bear parents. The grizzly bear (Ursus Arctos Horriblis) is a fierce predator that many prey and humans are scared of. They can weigh anywhere from 400-800 pounds and reach up to 10 feet tall. Grizzlies are omnivores that eat salmon, fruit, and various other fish.

Polar bears (Ursus maritimus) are the largest of the bear species. They weigh up to 1,300+ pounds and reach up to 8.3 feet. Polar bears are carnivores that eat seals and seabirds.

The pizzly bear can reach anywhere from 3-5 feet tall, 6.5-10 feet long, and can weigh about 1,000 pounds. Their primary diet is seal blubber, and because of this, they have smaller molars than the grizzly and polar bears do.

Watch the Video

Click here to watch the video.

The post This “Pizzly” Bear Is Real, and It’s Not Quite Polar or Grizzly appeared first on A-Z Animals.