Definition of interbreed in English:

verbinterbred

• 1no object (with reference to an animal) breed or cause to breed with another of a different race or species.

  ‘wolves and dogs can interbreed’

  More example sentences

  • ‘As a result, the fly provides the first evidence that two different animal species can interbreed and evolve into a new, distinct animal if their hybrid moves to a new habitat, the study suggests.’
  • ‘With closely related animals that can interbreed, it's not unusual for the dominant species to absorb the other, Trinkaus says.’
  • ‘These wild oxen appear to have made no detectable contribution to the domestic gene pool; they did not interbreed with their domestic contemporaries.’
  • ‘Non-indigenous rainbow interbreeds and competes with native species, and brown trout are threatened as a result.’
  • ‘It is part of a complex of closely related gull species that interbreed readily.’
  • ‘Because they are free to interbreed, the wild stock is of more or less mixed origin.’
  • ‘He says pet rabbits have a habit of digging their way to freedom, especially if kept outside in a garden, and that they often interbreed with native populations.’
  • ‘The rats offer several advantages to researchers: the rodents are a distinct species from later European stowaways, and therefore did not interbreed.’
  • ‘There are 54 to 58 species of Motacillidae, some of which interbreed.’
  • ‘If this process goes on long enough, parent and daughter species can no longer interbreed, and there results a new species.’
  • ‘This helps explain why the success of hybrids is so variable and also why some species can, and others cannot, interbreed.’
  • ‘He said that two organisms belonged to the same species if they are able to interbreed and produce fertile offspring.’
  • ‘Organisms from distinct but closely related species may be able to interbreed.’
  • ‘Farmed fish regularly and in increasing numbers escape into the wild where they interbreed, spread diseases to native species and dilute the natural gene pool.’
  • ‘The populations in the various parts of the world ocean are all genetically separate subspecies and, while they may co-mingle in breeding grounds, they rarely if ever interbreed.’
  • ‘Although the territories of populations overlap, they do not interbreed.’
  • ‘When the three species come into contact, they defend territories from one another and do not interbreed.’
  • ‘If both types inhabit the same place in the field, they usually interbreed.’
  • ‘These races can interbreed but they never produce halfbreeds.’
  • ‘The biological definition of a species states that if two races interbreed they belong in the same species.’

  Synonyms

  composite, cross-bred, interbred

  1. 1.1no object (of an animal) inbreed.
     as noun interbreeding ‘their energy and physique had been sapped by interbreeding’
     More example sentences

     • ‘The Government agreed to wipe out the UK's ruddy duck population after it was found the north American duck was challenging the survival of the globally-threatened white-headed duck through interbreeding.’
     • ‘New scientific information from the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service suggests the spotted owl is not entirely dependent on old-growth forest for habitat and faces a significant threat from interbreeding with the barred owl.’
     • ‘Wild Atlantic salmon stocks will be wiped out within decades because of interbreeding with escaped farmed stocks, leading scientists have warned.’
     • ‘Since their arrival in Africa, Indian cattle genes have thrived and through interbreeding, have spread throughout the continent.’
     • ‘Theories have ranged from interspecies genocide to interbreeding to humans' superior communication skills, hunting technology, and social organization.’
     • ‘These markers will be used to estimate interbreeding between field populations of the two developmental morphs to assess whether there is any evidence of speciation.’
     • ‘And though there are no discernible physical barriers to prevent intermingling or interbreeding, I have never seen mixed herds or any individual that looks like an intermediate form, or hybrid.’
     • ‘But taxonomists rarely actually test interbreeding with live animals or plants to see if they could actually produce healthy, fertile offspring.’
     • ‘The human race and their technologically able allies moved forth into the galaxy and dispersed, creating new worlds, and through interbreeding, new subspecies of races.’
     • ‘Genetic barriers to interbreeding in closely related birds are few, and fertile hybrid crosses are known between members of different genera that have presumably been separate for millions of years.’
     • ‘These differences in color are sufficient to prevent interbreeding among existing species.’
     • ‘Alan Templeton, a geneticist at Washington University in St. Louis who headed the study reported in Nature, has concluded that yes, there was interbreeding between the different groups.’
     • ‘Reproductive isolation - not interbreeding with either of the parent species - is one requirement for a species.’
     Synonyms

     hybrid, half-caste, half-breed, cross-breed, cross-bred, interbred, mongrel, impure