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Missouri

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sl8

(16,276 posts)
Fri Sep 11, 2020, 06:19 AM Sep 2020

St. Louis Zoo says python laid 7 eggs without male help yesterday [View all]

https://apnews.com/1b6262dfb39d2d7d7437534080b1748e

St. Louis Zoo says python laid 7 eggs without male help
yesterday


ST. LOUIS (AP) — Experts at the St. Louis Zoo are trying to figure out how a 62-year-old ball python laid seven eggs despite not being near a male python for at least two decades.

Mark Wanner, manager of herpetology at the zoo, said it unusual but not rare for ball pythons to reproduce asexually. The snakes also sometimes store sperm for delayed fertilization.

The birth also is unusual because ball pythons usually stop laying eggs long before they reach their 60s, Wanner said.

“She’d definitely be the oldest snake we know of in history,” to lay eggs, Wanner said, noting the she is the oldest snake ever documented in a zoo.

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