Polar bears may cross with brown bears

Hunters and scientists have long suspected this possibility. Roger Kuptana, a Northwest County tour guide, Canada, was the first to suggest that this really happened to a bear with a strange appearance shot last month - it was a cross between a polar bear and Brown bear.

The hybrid bear shot with the mother is the polar bear and the father is the brown bear. ( Photo: AP )

County officials confiscated the animal from an American sports hunter after noticing it had white fur on brown patches, long claws and hunchback like brown bear's. Now, DNA testing has confirmed that it is a hybrid bear, perhaps the first case recorded in nature.

Polar bears and brown bears successfully pair together in zoos - something confusing for scientists - and their children can still reproduce. The breeding season of the two species is almost the same, the polar white bear a little earlier.

T. An