Abstract
Though belonging to genera that have been distinct for several million years, gelada and common baboons—Theropithecus gelada and Papio hamadryas sensu lato, respectively—interbreed occasionally, even in the wild. A female hamadryas at Bihere Tsige Park, Addis Ababa, Ethiopia, apparently favored a gelada male over eligible conspecifics and produced several offspring with him. The F 1 hybrids were large but developmentally normal. In skull and tooth form, and to a lesser extent in postcranial proportions, they were intermediate between the parental forms but lacked most of their parents' derived, (sub)species-specific epigamic characters. A female infant born to a subadult F 1 was sired by a hamadryas. The backcross infant appeared normal and was still flourishing at about 2.5 years. Though perhaps impeded by natural selection against poorly adapted hybrids, theoretically interspecific hybridization could exceed mutation as a source of novel, preadapted genes in the wild.
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Jolly, C.J., Woolley-Barker, T., Beyene, S. et al. Intergeneric Hybrid Baboons. International Journal of Primatology 18, 597–627 (1997). https://doi.org/10.1023/A:1026367307470
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1023/A:1026367307470