Seven baby Jesus's

Flora, a Komodo Dragon lizard at the Chester Zoo, joins London Zoo's Sungai among the first of the species to exhibit parthenognesis - 'virgin' birth without the participation of a boy-dragon. Flora has seven babies on the way.

Asexual reproduction among reptiles is not uncommon. For instance there are multiple species of Amazonian all-female Virgin Whiptail lizards. And, yes, they do bump uglies. For fun, presumably, and mating behaviours appear to reinforce hormonal cycles as well.

I readily confess that I lack the biological knowledge to tease out the hapliod/diploid problem here. Googling did not help answer my basic "WTF!?" question: How many chromosomes these critters have, and what difference it makes.

Flora.


Girl cooties!

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