Melanistic animals

ONE of just six ultra-rare black tigers known to exist in the world has been miraculously snapped by an amateur photographer. Soumen Bajpayee took the pictures of the melanistic tiger, whose thick …

Nature is both wonderful and tricky: always changing, always adapting, always evolving. Nothing illustrates this sentiment better than melanism — a rare genetic mutation — even more uncommon than albinism — that turns animals pitch-black, truly making them a sight to behold.

Know the animals that are melanistic with a list of their names and images.

Silver fox sitting pretty, a color morph of the red fox #Vulpes_vulpes #mytumblr

Servals are members of the cat family found in Africa, notable for their very long legs and large ears. Like most felines, servals are prone to melanism but with one difference: the feature is more common in servals living at higher altitudes. It may be that melanism bestows advantages to the mountain-dwelling servals, perhaps relating to heat conservation and camouflage in rockier alpine environments.

(Not my pic)