Looking for an example of speciation in action- forgotten name of animal.

[matthyaouw]

I remember reading a while ago about an animal with a fairly large range. Animals in areas adjacent to each other were genetically similar enough to interbreeed with no problems, but animals from opposite ends of their range could not. I think they existed in semi-isolated populations but am not sure. Does anyone know what it is that I'm thinking of?

 

[Danger]

Scotsmen?

 

[turbo]

Scotsmen?

No, breeding Scotsmen from any part of their range yields equivalent results. Breeding them with Scotswomen, however, favors larger broods in the rural areas.

 

[Danger]

Aye. Meet the couple of the year... Ben Dover and Phil McCrevis.

Hmmm... lessee here...
Scotswomen...sheep... Scotswomen... sheep...

I think that it would result in a booming wool industry.

 

[jim mcnamara]

Take away the humor and these two guys are useless. :)

By animals: do you mean mammals, or birds, or what? There are a lot studies that kind of resemble what you're talking about.

 

[matthyaouw]

I think that they were mammals but I'm unsure. Any example would be useful to be honest.

 

[Danger]

This month's SciAm has a nice article about the evolution of cats that indicates such a thing happened to the various species several times.

And on Jim.

 

[turbo]

You may want to look up "ring species". You may find examples.

 

[Rade]

As said--the concept is that of the ring species--famous example is salamander genus Ensatina, --see here:

http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/evolution/library/05/2/l_052_05.html

 

[matthyaouw]

Brilliant, thanks