This “Grue Jay” hybrid looks great as hell – but it is a warning sign

Learn about “Grue Jay”, a rare offspring from Jay Azraq and Jay Al -Akhdar – a common type that has been evolutionary 7 million years ago. The resulting bird feathers is steadfast and modern blue. But the wonderful discovery lie to the fact that its existence may be the product of the threat of climate change for bird life.

In a conversation Environment and development Biologists at the University of Texas at Austin Jay, the strange detail, describe how the Blue and green ranges may have exceeded this hybrid bird. According to their analysis, Gaiz Al -Akhdar – a tropical bird in Central America – migrated north as a result of temperature changes. In the end, her paths with Blue Jayez, moderate, common species in the eastern United States that transformed the West Group, crossed.

“We believe that this first observable vertebarity is being crossed out as a result of expanding their scope due to climate change,” said Brian Stoxus, the lead author of the study and post -PhD student at the University of Texas in Austin. statement.

Lucky discovery

In the spring of 2023, Stoxx stumbled in a “beloved” image of a blue -like plane but was “clearly different”, as he explained. After contacting the informal birds that published the photo, Stoxus seized the bird, took a quick blood sample, marked her leg, and released it.

Returning to the laboratory, Stoxus and his advisor, co -author Tim Kate, performed a detailed analysis of the genetic information of birds. First, they briefly made some parental candidates on the basis of their scope and physical appearance. Next, compare the DNA data from Jay al -Gharib to the candidates.

Their investigation confirmed that the bird was a male hybrid offspring of the Green Jay and the Blue Jay. The hybrid age was at least at least two years, “which indicates that he survived a whole year without being informed of any public database,” according to the paper.

Stokes and Kett continued to monitor bird channels for additional scenes of similar individuals, although they could not find anything else. However, it is interesting, that the same person who was monitored in 2023 returned to the backyard of the Berder in June this year.

“I don’t know what it was, but it was somewhat like the random event,” said Stox. “If he had gone two houses, then it may not have been reported anywhere.”

Natural or man -made?

Stoxus said that the similar hybrid so far, such as “GROLAR” or “Coywolf”, has mainly appeared as a producer of direct human influence, such as the introduction of gas species. Although climate change can be said that it is man -made, Jay is the first hybrid “it seems that it happened when the transformations in the weather patterns were stimulated to expand both the two types of mother”, he added.

Regardless, Jay “joins an increased list of improper interactions resulting from human change,” the authors note in the paper. He added that with the progress of climate change, we will see more of these unbearable unions in nature. If so, the functions of environmental scientists may grow to include chasing these migratory changes and new interactions – a stressful task, taking into account how difficult it is to face such events.

“The hybridization may be more common in the natural world than the researchers know because there is a lot of inability to report these things,” Stock said. “Perhaps this is possible in many types that we do not see because they are physically separate from each other, and therefore they do not have the opportunity to try to mate.”