Grolar Bear / Pizzly Bear / Grizzlar / Nanulak

[Admin Pete]

Grizzly–Polar Bear hybrid

A grizzly–polar bear hybrid (also named grolar bear, pizzly bear, grizzlar, or nanulak) is a rare ursid hybrid that has occurred both in captivity and in the wild. In 2006, the occurrence of this hybrid in nature was confirmed by testing the DNA of a unique-looking bear that had been shot near Sachs Harbour, Northwest Territories on Banks Island in the Canadian Arctic. The number of confirmed hybrids has since risen to eight, all of them descending from the same female polar bear.

Possible wild-bred polar bear-grizzly bear hybrids have been reported and shot in the past, but DNA tests were not available to verify the bears' ancestry.

Genetic analysis has revealed multiple instances of introgressive hybridization between bear species, including introgression of polar bear DNA into brown bears during the Pleistocene ("grizzly bear" is a local common name for Ursus arctos whereas "brown bear" is used internationally and in science to refer to the species as a whole).

[Admin Pete]

Since the 2006 discovery placed the hybrid into the spotlight, the media have referred to this animal with several portmanteau names, such as pizzly bear, grolar bear, and polizzly, but there is no consensus on the use of any one of these terms. Canadian wildlife officials have suggested calling the hybrid "nanulak", taken from the Inuit names for polar bear (nanuk) and grizzly bear (aklak).

By one convention, the name of the sire comes first in such combinations: the offspring of a male polar bear and a female grizzly would be the suggested nanulak or a "pizzly bear", while the offspring of a male grizzly and a female polar bear would be a "grolar bear" or possibly an aknuk.