Did you know the komodo dragon is a parthenogenic animal? (See the title.)
I didn’t. I also didn’t know it has W and Z chromosomes. Females are WZ and males are ZZ, so only male parthenogenic offspring are viable.
A Komodo dragon with no male partner gave birth to three hatchlings
Charlie, a female Komodo dragon at the Chattanooga Zoo in Tennessee,
has proved to be the ultimate independent lady after successfully giving birth to three hatchlings without a male partner.
Even though Charlie and a potential mate named Kadal were placed together in hopes of breeding, the first-time mother produced the three brothers, named Onyx, Jasper and Flint, on her own through a phenomenon called parthenogenesis. It’s extremely rare among vertebrates: Only 70 backboned species can do it, which is about 0.1% of all vertebrates, according to Scientific American.
Komodo is definitely not an anagram of kodomo (child *, in Japanese). They are aggressive and hostile, even within their own species.
[* corrected]
This is very cool and totally new to me.
(Everything I know about chromosomes, I learned in high school. 50 years ago.)
(“kodomo” means “child”. “tomodachi” is “friend”.)
Whoops, right. I’m having oneof those days….
Tim Minchin mentioned the parthenogenesis of Komodo dragons in his song, “Woddy Allen Jesus”, which I believe can be found on the You Tubes. Enjoy.
Woody