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From Jan 01, 1999 To May 16, 2008
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Jan 13, 2002; 03:17AM - Imacculate Conception?
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Category: [other]
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Author Name: Anon
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Author E-mail: Anon
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Report Description:
Saturday January 12, 6:00 AM
U.S. zoo investigates "virgin" shark birth
OMAHA (Reuters) - Unraveling the mysterious "virgin" birth of a bonnethead shark in Nebraska last month should make an "interesting research paper," a zoo director said on Friday.
The trio of female bonnethead sharks living in a tank at Henry Doorly Zoo in Omaha "have never been even close to a male bonnethead shark since they arrived as 2 to 3-pound (1 to 1.4 kg) pups," zoo director Lee Simmons said.
There is a male epaulet shark in the same tank, but it is a different species than the bonnethead, which is a smaller version of the hammerhead shark, and would correspond to "a Chihuahua impregnating a Saint Bernard," Simmons said.
DNA tests were begun this week on tissue and blood samples taken from the 3-year-old female bonnetheads and the pup, which died five hours after it was born on Dec. 14 after being bitten by a stingray that lives in the same tank.
Several weeks of testing will be needed to determine which shark was the mother and who might have fathered the pup.
Though sperm can survive inside a shark's reproductive tract for months or even years, asexual reproduction is unheard of in sharks, Simmons said.
"We want to know if there was a father or if there was a weird hybridization of species. It will make a damn interesting research paper," he said. |
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