Anna the anaconda has gone full Jurassic Park at the New England Aquarium and produced offspring with no help from a male.
Just like in the film, Anna was placed in an all-female environment as a form of birth control, since green anacondas can give birth to dozens of baby snakes at a time. But staffers at the zoo recently discovered that Anna had, in fact, given birth to three live snakelings and a dozen stillborn. Experts say that’s rare but not unheard of, and The Washington Post made a joke, which is also rare but not unheard of:
“The staffers immediately suspected a rare reproductive strategy called parthenogenesis, which means that a female organism can self-impregnate. She does not need no man-aconda.”
A DNA test confirmed that all the surviving babies (another one died 48 hours after birth) contained only Anna’s DNA. Good job, Anna! I love this journey for you.
Hope you all successfully produced your own little wonders this week.