Bushbuck, two species?

[Wolverine67]

Did some reading about the bushbuck and came across this:

Bushbuck - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Looks like the harnessed bushbucks are a separate specie from the cape/chobe/limpopo bushbuck. They now call the harnessed bushbucks for kewel and the others for imbabala. This was not known to me, and clearly shows that modern genetic research change our view on established truth.

 

[enysse]

I would say they are different for sure. When you look at the cape bushbuck and the harnessed bushbuck geographically, it's two different environments, the colors are different and I'm sure the food, temperatures, land and everything else is different. I'm sure all bushbucks are hard to hunt, unless the land is lightly hunted.

 

[controlled_feed]

If what I read recently is accurate, and you want to get taxanomic on someones arse, there are over a dozen sub species.

 

[daggaboyblog]

Chris and Tilde Stuart suggest tat here are up to 29 sub species of bushbuck in Field Guide to the Larger Mammals of Africa.

 

[Wolverine67]

I was aware of the subspecies. But if they can be divided into two different species, it means we have 10 spiralhorns in Africa, not 9.

 

[Diamondhitch]

I was aware of the subspecies. But if they can be divided into two different species, it means we have 10 spiralhorns in Africa, not 9.

Thats the difference in this discussion compared to others on here, there are 2 distinct species of Bushbuck as well as several sub-species comprised of both accepted and disputed varieties..

 

[Nyati]

Same story again, are they really genetically different ?

Should we trust wikipedia ?

 

[Wolverine67]

The question about wherever we can trust wikipedia or not, I cannot answer. But if the article are correct, are the harnessed bushbuck closely related to the nyala and the other bushbucks more related to the bongo. Kind of strange really, that the northern specie are less related to the bongo....

 

[Diamondhitch]

Same story again, are they really genetically different ?

Absolutely, unlike many sub-species, the 2 species of Bushbuck bear different scientific names. They are genetically as different as Mountain Nyala and Southern Nyala, same name for very genetically different animals. I have read this in several sources and have seen nothing disputing it.