Interspecies Mating

[RcGrant]

There are some pretty knowledgeable people here, so I'm hoping maybe some of you can point me in the right direction.

I have a humanoid species in my book that I need to mate with humans to create a half-breed. Pretty common fare, right? Only...I don't really know how much of an explanation I would have to give (in the book) about the biology of this. Would I have to go into it at all for it to be a believable concept? How possible would it be? What sort of conditions, biologically, would need to be met, at a basic level (yes yes, we all know slot A into hole B!) for this to work?

It's not a big feature of the story (the how and the why); the focus of this particular section of the book is on the resulting half-breed and what happens to them. But I am assuming I have to give some sort of explanation that would be acceptable.

Scratching my head here. Help!

 

[Ursa major]

While this sort of thing happens in sci-fi - Star Trek, for example - I think you would have to be very careful in an SF book: there are so many obstacles, even between similar Earth-based species, that it is hard to see how two products on different evolutions could be in any way compatible.

(Unless, that is, you are trying to suggest something: manipulated genomes; the planting of incredibly similar species on different planets across a number of star systems; that kind of thing. Or it's an SF-romp/comedy where anything goes - though I doubt your work falls under this heading.)

 

[RcGrant]

While this sort of thing happens in sci-fi - Star Trek, for example - I think you would have to be very careful in an SF book. (Unless, that is, you are trying to suggest something: manipulated genomes; the planting of incredibly similar species on different planets across a number of star systems; that kind of thing.)

I should probably mention here that I'm not writing sci-fi. I'm writing fantasy, though I don't know if that makes a difference. I'd rather not spend precious pages waffling on about the how and where of the biological existence, but I guess I'm asking whether it's okay to write about a half-species, as such, without having to go into explanation.

 

[zachariah]

Is it sci-fi or fantasy? If it's fantasy, I doubt you'll need any real explanation. Check out the prologue to Battleaxe for a successful take on the subject.

For sci-fi, you may want to get into some biological details, depending on how hard-core you want to be. Stop that! I meant hard-core SF. There'll always be a section of the audience that gets off on graphic science descriptions (I said stop that) so you'll have to crack some books on biology if you want to satisfy people who need to know how the gametes meet and cell fusion occurs.

 

[Ursa major]

Fantasy is a whole different kettle of fish, RcG; although perhaps we oughtn't to go there. If successful inter-species coupling is facilitated by the rules of your fantasy universe, so be it. (You can always call on the Oneness of Life, or something like that.)



* Ducks the rocks thrown by fantasy enthusiasts. *

 

[The Judge]

Doesn't this all rather depend on how 'human' your humanoid is?

As to the mechanics, then mammals mate by intromission, so unless your humanoid is very different, that shouldn't be too much of a problem. The difficulty in mating between species is whether offspring can be conceived. I don't imagine, for instance, that a human male could impregnate a female chimpanzee. Some cross-species mating produces young - horses and donkeys for instance, but it's vanishingly rare for the mules to be fertile.

To get back to hominoids, as I understand it, there is some evidence that homo sapiens and neanderthals mated, producing offspring who were themselves fertile. So, if your hominoid is as near to humans as Neanderthals were, there shouldn't be a problem. (I don't mean for you to work out the genome of your hominoid, just basically what they look like is enough.)

As for explaining it in the book - I think most people are likely to accept it on trust, aren't they? After all, it's hardly rare in SFF circles - Spock being one of the most visible (and frankly least explicable). Unless you're interested in researching the science of DNA or other stuff, I'd say not to bother. If you start getting stick from geeks after your first book is published, just write any explanation into the second part of the trilogy!

J

 

[RcGrant]

Doesn't this all rather depend on how 'human' your humanoid is?

As to the mechanics, then mammals mate by intromission, so unless your humanoid is very different, that shouldn't be too much of a problem. The difficulty in mating between species is whether offspring can be conceived. I don't imagine, for instance, that a human male could impregnate a female chimpanzee. Some cross-species mating produces young - horses and donkeys for instance, but it's vanishingly rare for the mules to be fertile.

To get back to hominoids, as I understand it, there is some evidence that homo sapiens and neanderthals mated, producing offspring who were themselves fertile. So, if your hominoid is as near to humans as Neanderthals were, there shouldn't be a problem. (I don't mean for you to work out the genome of your hominoid, just basically what they look like is enough.)

As for explaining it in the book - I think most people are likely to accept it on trust, aren't they? After all, it's hardly rare in SFF circles - Spock being one of the most visible (and frankly least explicable). Unless you're interested in researching the science of DNA or other stuff, I'd say not to bother. If you start getting stick from geeks after your first book is published, just write any explanation into the second part of the trilogy!

J

Thank you. This has put a few things into perspective. I didn't think of mules either, which could be a good route to explore, especially as the half-breed don't have to be fertile.

 

[Teresa Edgerton]

I think once you try to explain it, there will always be people who will tear your explanation apart. So it's probably better to skip the explanations.

Anyway, it does happen in the natural world, aside from horses and donkeys. I know that some of the big cats interbreed, lions and tigers, pumas and leopards. With the ligers the males are sterile but the females are usually fertile.

Edit -- You might want to read this article:

http://abcnews.go.com/Technology/story?id=680747

 

[The Ace]

You could always check out Hoopy's diresters (half direwolf, half giant hamster and passionate about tomatoes).

 

[Jimmy Magnusson]

Depends on your view on SciFi...

1. If you're of the hard SF school and want things in your novel to realistic, cross-species mating will in all likelyhood have to go (you could also make a case that humanoid aliens are only so likely to happen), unless they derive from a common source (space dust!). Then you'd get away with it.

2. If you're the Star Wars kind of person (a show of hands, people!), then no need to explain. It just works because, well, because it does. People accept it for what it is. Willing suspension of disbelief.

 

[Interference]

I have a humanoid species in my book that I need to mate with humans to create a half-breed. Pretty common fare, right? Only...I don't really know how much of an explanation I would have to give (in the book) about the biology of this.

None, in my view.

If it's a single instance, it can be a remarkable fluke. If it recurs, let their biologists investigate it and produce a 1000 page report that can be synopsised in dialogue in a sentence.

 

[Pyan]

Tolkien's Elves and Men were interfertile: Eldarion

It was a very rare event, (three examples in 8000+ years, IIRC) but did happen.

JRRT made no attempt to explain why this was possible, though, and said nothing so effectively that I've actually never questioned the biological make-up of Eldarion before now...

I'd agree with Jimmy M's second point (above) - willing suspension of belief is a powerful force...

 

[Dozmonic]

This reminds me somewhat of reading Zecharia Sitchin's Earth Chronicles. He interpretation of Sumerian texts is that their gods were beings from another planet and that they came to earth and needed to create a worker for themselves. Their first attempts produced Neanderthals, who were capable, but Enki (the god in charge of this) was not happy with that work and went a step further and - this was all done by genetic engineering I should add - created Cro-Magnon. There were lots of failed attempts too and because the Sumerians were not technologically advanced enough to understand this properly they referred to it as manipulating the essence of man, and represented DNA as the caduceus, two snakes intertwined along a pole. The final manipulation that created modern man was the interbreeding of the "gods" with men.

The tales tell of creatures created that were humanoid but blind, deaf, or dumb. And they were taught how to do things such as play instruments or paint, according to what they were capable of so they could have a life of sorts.

True or otherwise, it gives a possible view of a non-scientific understanding of genetics in crossbreeding and creating a species. Without knowing your whole world, it's impossible to know if or how this fits.

In modern primates cross breeding is much more rare. A highland and lowland gorilla simply cannot cross breed. Humans cannot breed with other primates because we have less chromosomes than they do.

One book I have read, I forget who it is by, talks about the early 1900s and a town in Russia somewhere in Siberia having caught a yeti and she was a peaceful being and mothered three children to the people of the town. That must be strong vodka at work there ;-)

 

[chrispenycate]

Interspecies fertility has been standard in mythology from the dawn of humanity. Gods, nymphs and satyrs, obviously distinct species by life span if not by appearance, have all been responsible for births with humans (frequently heroes) while, if you accept the Piers Anthony analysis, all your centaurs, harpies, sphinxes, gryphons and the like are hybrid forms inevitable in high concentrations of magic and relaxed moral standards.

If the beings you are intending to mate with are humanoid, little diverged from the main line, crossbreeds are even more likely; incubi are a bit difficult to explain away. And some of the Selkies and mer-folk are a challenge mechanically, even if they're obviously crossbreeds themselves.

Just assume that genetics is as null a subject as physics or chemistry, and you could get your wurm wanting to breed with the sacrificial maiden rather than eat her; a symbolism which is fairly clear in some old documents…

 

[Sapheron]

You realise that some humans racial groups are far enough apart that they can experience difficulty having children? It's rare, but in some extreme cases certain ethnic groups are only partially compatible. We're the same species. On that note, it's safe to say breeding with other species entirely is near enough completely impossible.

So go for it. Everyone else has, and no one shot them for it.

 

[RcGrant]

Thank you everyone - you've all given some great answers, and many things for me to mull over. To answer a few people specifically:

Teresa: Thanks so much for finding that article; it gave me a lot to think about, and provided a few answers of the mechanics, which is a perspective that always seems to help me.

Pyan: I never thought of Tolkien (possibly because reading LotR gives me a headache) but that makes me feel like I am at least in good company.

Dozmonic: I love that story about the Gods! Since my trilogy is very much seeped in traditional mythology, it's something I'm going to explore a little more, even though I have no plans to use it explicitly in this way.

Chris: Didn't think about nymphs, etc. I think this was a case of being too close to my story to see the wood for the trees. Cheers!

So apparently this is less of a worry than I first thought. On the bright side (and I have The Judge and his mules to thank for this), my muse has been hard at work all day and I think I have a breakthrough. One of those 'this feels better than sex!' rushes.

Ahhh!

 

[Teresa Edgerton]

Dozmonic, as I understand it, related species with different numbers of chromosomes can breed if the one with the fewer chromosomes is the male -- as is the case with horse/zebra crosses.

It probably depends on how far the numbers of chromosomes differ though.

 

[Karn Maeshalanadae]

You really need no explanation, RC. There's half-elves, half-orcs, half-ogres, that kind of thing. In Harry Potter Hagrid is the offspring of a human and a giant.

Even in the real world donkeys and horses can breed to bare mules.

 

[ctg]

If you need a explanation, then in plot terms you can make either something wrong with the pregnancy or with the offspring. The logical result would be a scientific investigation, where the investigators could ask questions like "How did you do it?"

In a way, you can always make an plausible excuse for a info-dump, no matter what genre you are writing. Sometimes these sort of mix-ups can be really good drama. So don't shy away on doing some exploration.

 

[Dozmonic]

Dozmonic, as I understand it, related species with different numbers of chromosomes can breed if the one with the fewer chromosomes is the male -- as is the case with horse/zebra crosses.

It probably depends on how far the numbers of chromosomes differ though.

I have heard of this, yeah. And it'd typify our gender to be the ones to try it too ;-)