Panthera 

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A Panthera hybrid is a crossbreed between individuals of any of the five species of

the genus Panthera: the tiger, lion, jaguar, leopard, and snow leopard.
Most hybrids would not be perpetuated in the wild as the territories of the parental
species do not overlap and the males are usually infertile. Mitochondrial
genome research revealed that wild hybrids were also present in ancient times. The
mitochondrial genomes of the snow leopard and the lion were more similar to each
other than to other Panthera species, indicating that at some point in their history,
the female progeny of male ancestors of modern snow leopards and female
ancestors of modern lions interbred with male ancestors of modern snow leopards. [1][2]

History[edit]
In theory, lions and tigers can be matched in the wild and give offspring, but in reality
there may be no natural born tigon or liger in the world, because they are separated
both geographically, by behavioral differences and lives in different places and do
not mate together in the wild. In England, African lions and Asian tigresses have
been successfully mated, and three lion-tiger hybrid cubs were born in Windsor in
1824, which is probably the earliest record, the three cubs were then presented
to George IV.

Table of names for hybrids[edit]

Below are some tables showing the many Panthera hybrids.[3] Panthera hybrids are
typically given a portmanteau name, varying by which species is the sire (male
parent) and which is the dam (female parent). For example, a hybrid between a lion
and a tigress is a liger, because the lion is the male parent and the tigress is the
female parent.

Tigress ♀ Lioness ♀ Jaguaress ♀ Leopardess ♀

Tiger ♂ Tigon ♂ Tiguar ♂ Tipard ♂

Tiger ♂
Tigress ♀ Tigoness ♀ Tiguaress ♀ Tipardess ♀

Liger ♂ Lion ♂ Liguar ♂ Lipard ♂

Lion ♂
Ligress ♀ Lioness ♀ Liguaress ♀ Lipardess ♀

Jagger ♂ Jaglion ♂ Jaguar ♂ Jagupard ♂

Jaguar ♂
Jaggress ♀ Jaglioness ♀ Jaguaress ♀ Jagupardess ♀

Leoger ♂ Leopon ♂ Leguar ♂ Leopard ♂

Leopard ♂
Leogress ♀ Leoponess ♀ Leguaress ♀ Leopardess ♀

Jaguar and leopard hybrids[edit]

A jagupard, jagulep or jagleop is the hybrid of a jaguar and a leopardess. A
single rosetted female jagupard was produced at a zoo in Chicago (America).
Jaguar-leopard hybrids bred at Hellbrun Zoo, Salzburg were described as jagupards,
which conforms to the usual portmanteau naming convention.[4]
A leguar or lepjag is the hybrid of a male leopard and a female jaguar. The terms
jagulep and lepjag are often used interchangeably, regardless of which animal was
the sire. Numerous lepjags have been bred as animal actors, as they are more
tractable than jaguars.
A.D. Bartlett [5] stated: "I have, more than once, met with instances of the male jaguar
(P. onca) breeding with a female leopard (P. pardus). These hybrids were also
reared recently in Wombell's well-known travelling collection. I have seen some
animals of this kind bred, between a male black jaguar and a female Indian leopard:-
the young partook strongly of the male, being almost black."
In Barnabos Menagerie (in Spain), a jaguar gave birth to two cubs from a union with
a black leopard; one resembled the dam, but was somewhat darker, while the other
was black with the rosettes of the dam showing. [6] Since melanism in the panther
(leopard) is recessive, the jaguar would have had to have been black, or be a jaguar-
black leopard hybrid itself, carrying the recessive gene. Scherren continued, "The
same cross, but with the sexes reversed, was noted, by Professor Sacc (F)
of Barcelona Zoo (Zoolog. Gart., 1863, 88). "The cub, a female, was grey. She is
said to have produced two cubs to her sire; one like a jaguar, the other like the dam.
Herr Rorig expressed his regret that the account of the last two cases mentioned
lacked fullness and precision."
Female jaguleps or lepjags are fertile, and when one is mated to a male lion, the
offspring are referred to as lijaguleps. One such complex hybrid was exhibited in the
early 1900s as a "Congolese spotted lion", hinting at some exotic African beast,
rather than a man-made hybrid.

Jaguar and lion hybrids[edit]

Jaguar/lion hybrid, Rothschild Museum, Tring

A jaglion or jaguon is the offspring between a male jaguar and a female lion
(lioness). A mounted specimen is on display at the Walter Rothschild Zoological
Museum, Hertfordshire, England. It has the lion's background color, brown, jaguar-
like rosettes and the powerful build of the jaguar.
On April 9, 2006, two jaglions were born at Bear Creek Wildlife Sanctuary, Barrie
(north of Toronto), Ontario, Canada. Jahzara (female) and Tsunami (male) were the
result of an unintended mating between a black jaguar called Diablo and a lioness
called Lola, which had been hand-raised together and were inseparable. They were
kept apart when Lola came into oestrus. Tsunami is spotted, but Jahzara is a
melanistic jaglion due to inheriting the jaguar's dominant melanism gene. It was not
previously known how the jaguar's dominant melanism gene would interact with lion
coloration genes.
A liguar is an offspring of a male lion and a female jaguar.
When the fertile offspring of a male lion and female jaguar mates with a leopard, the
resulting offspring is referred to as a leoliguar.[citation needed]

Jaguar and tiger hybrids[edit]

A tiguar is an offspring of a male tiger and a jaguaress. Reportedly, at the Altiplano
Zoo in the city of San Pablo Apetatlan (near Tlaxcala, México), the crossbreeding of
a male Siberian tiger and a female jaguar[7][8] from the southern Chiapas
Jungle produced a male tiguar named Mickey. Mickey is on exhibition at a 400
m2 habitat and as of June 2009, was two years old and weighed 180 kg (400 lb).
Attempts to verify this report have been bolstered by recent images purported to
show the adult Mickey (see External links section). There has been no report of the
birth of a hybrid from a male jaguar and female tiger, which would be termed a
"jagger".[citation needed]
There is a claimed sighting of a lion × black jaguar cross (male) and a tiger × black
jaguar cross (female) loose in Maui, Hawaii. There are no authenticated tiger/jaguar
hybrids and the description matches that of a liger. The alleged tiger × black jaguar
was large, relatively long-necked (probably due to lack of a ruff or mane) with both
stripes and "jaguar-like" rosettes on its sides. The assertion of hybrid identity was
due to the combination of black, dark brown, light brown, dark orange, dark yellow
and beige markings and the tiger-like stripes radiating from its face. It is more likely
to have been a released liger, since these are very large and have a mix of rosettes
(lion juvenile markings) and stripes and can have a brindled mix of colors exactly as
described (their markings are extremely variable). [9]

Leopard and lion hybrids[edit]

Taxidermy Leopon

A leopon is the result of breeding a male leopard with a lioness. [10] The head of the
animal is similar to that of a lion, while the rest of the body carries similarities to
leopards. Leopons are very rare.
A lipard or liard is the proper term for a hybrid of a male lion with a leopardess. [11] It is
sometimes known as a reverse leopon. The size difference between a male lion and
a leopardess usually makes their mating difficult.
A lipard was born in Schoenbrunn Zoo, Vienna in 1951.
Another lipard was born in Florence, Italy. It is often erroneously referred to as a
leopon. The father was a two-year-old, 250-kg lion, 1.08 m tall at the shoulders and
1.8 m long (excluding the tail). The mother was a 3.5-year-old leopardess weighing
only 38 kg. The female cub was born overnight on 26/27 August 1982 after an
estimated 92–93 days of gestation.
It was born on the grounds of a paper mill near Florence, to a lion and leopardess
acquired from a Rome zoo. Their owner had two tigers, two lions and a leopardess
as pets, and did not expect or intend them to breed. The lion/leopard hybrid cub
came as a surprise to the owner, who originally thought the small, spotted creature in
the cage was a stray domestic cat.
The mother began to over-groom the underside of the cub's tail and later bit off its
tail. The cub was then hand-reared. The parents mated again in November 1982,
and the lion and leopardess were separated.
They were brought together on Jan. 25, 1983 for photographs, but the lion
immediately mounted the leopardess and they had to be separated again for fear of
endangering her advanced pregnancy.
The cub had the body conformation of a lion cub with a large head (a lion trait), but a
receding forehead (a leopard trait), fawn fur and thick, brown spotting. When it
reached five months old, the owner offered it for sale and set about trying to breed
more.[12]
The male leopon is a fertile offspring of a male leopard and a female lion. The fertile
female liguar, offspring of a male lion and female jaguar, is capable of fertilization by
a leopon. Their mating, though rare, results in a leopliguar [citation needed].
Leopard and tiger hybrids[edit]
The name dogla is a native Indian name used for a supposedly natural hybrid
offspring of a male leopard and a tigress, the combination designated leoger in the
table above. Indian folklore claims that large male leopards sometimes mate with
tigresses, and anecdotal evidence exists in India of offspring resulting from leopard
to tigress matings. A supposed dogla was reported in the early 1900s. Many reports
probably[citation needed] refer to large leopards with abdominal striping or other striped
shoulders and bodies of a tiger. One account stated, "On examining it, I found it to
be a very old male hybrid. Its head and tail were purely those of a panther Indian
leopard, but with the body, shoulders, and neck ruff of a tiger. The pattern was a
combination of rosettes and stripes; the stripes were black, broad and long, though
somewhat blurred and tended to break up into rosettes. The head was spotted. The
stripes predominated over the rosettes." The pelt of this hybrid, if it ever existed, was
lost. It was supposedly larger than a leopard and, though male, it showed some
feminization of features, which might be expected in a sterile male hybrid.
K Sankhala's book Tiger refers to large, troublesome leopards as adhabaghera,
which he translated as "bastard", and suggests a leopard/tiger hybrid (the reverse
hybrid is unlikely to arise in the wild state, as a wild male tiger would probably kill
rather than mate with a female leopard). Sankhala noted there was a belief amongst
local people that leopards and tigers naturally hybridise.
From "The Tiger, Symbol Of Freedom", edited by Nicholas Courtney: "Rare reports
have been made of tigresses mating with leopards in the wild. There has even been
an account of the sighting of rosettes; the stripes of the tiger being most prominent in
the body. The animal was a male measuring a little over eight feet [2.44 m]." This is
the same description as given by Hicks.
The 1951 book Mammalian Hybrids reported tiger/leopard matings were infertile,
producing spontaneously aborted "walnut-sized fetuses".
A tigard is the hybrid offspring of a male tiger and a leopardess. The only known
attempts to mate the two have produced stillborns.
In 1900, Carl Hagenbeck crossed a female leopard with a Bengal tiger. The stillborn
offspring had a mixture of spots, rosettes and stripes. Henry Scherren [13] wrote, "A
male tiger from Penang served two female Indian leopards, and twice with success.
Details are not given and the story concludes somewhat lamely. 'The leopardess
dropped her cubs prematurely, the embryos were in the first stage of development
and were scarcely as big as young mice.' Of the second leopardess there is no
mention."

Lion and tiger hybrids[edit]

Liger

Tiliger cross of (Panthera leo x Panthera tigris) x Panthera tigris

The resulting hybrids that crossbreeding between lions and tigers are known as tigon
(/ˈtaɪɡən/) and liger (/ˈlaɪɡə/). The second generation hybrids of liger or tigon are
known as liliger, tiliger, litigon and titigon. The tigon (Panthera tigris X leo), also
known as tiglon (/ˈtaɪɡlən/) is an offspring of a male tiger (Panthera tigris) and a
female lion (Panthera leo).[14] A liger is distinct from tigon (Panthera leo X tigris), as a
hybrid of female tiger and male lion. [15][16] In the case a fertile titigon has crossed
between a female tigard, the hybrid is rare.