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Rare Virgin Shark Births Reported in Detroit

Posted by timothy on from the signs-of-the-something-or-other dept.

randomErr writes "Voice of America reported that 'Officials at Detroit's Belle Isle Aquarium say a shark there recently produced three babies in an event they are calling virgin births. The mother, a white spotted bamboo shark has lived at the aquarium without any male counterparts for the past six years.'"

8 of 78 comments (clear)

  1. it's a frickin miracle by pizza_milkshake · · Score: 4, Funny

    i say abandon the whole Jesus-worshipping thing... nail those shark babies to a wooden cross and someone'll worship them. not me though. nope.

  2. Too Much Hoopla by jeramybsmith · · Score: 5, Interesting
    Shark reproduction is still pretty much voodoo to the scientific community. Take the white shark, we know zilch about them. Only after we attached some gps units to some white sharks did we discover that they like to take little trips down into the abyss now and then (and we we have no clue why they do it or what they eat while down there).

    All in all, I suspect there is nothing miraculous about reproduction. My guess is either the shark has weird 6 year gestation or that the shark was a builtin survival mechanism where if it does not produce offspring for a long time it essentially clones itself by reproducing from its own sole DNA.

    --
    Never overestimate the end user. -jeramy b. smith
  3. Busted... damn! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Funny

    Note to self:

    Stop sneaking into aquariums and having sexual intercourse with the sharks.

  4. Stored sperm by crow · · Score: 4, Insightful

    In some species, the female will store sperm after mating for future fertilization. Perhaps something like that is at work here? It should be easy enough to do a DNA test to see if the offspring have a father.

  5. It does happen by damiangerous · · Score: 4, Interesting

    in some other higher species. Most notably and frequently, in turkeys.

  6. Shark sperms can swim for long distances by savage_panda · · Score: 4, Funny

    It's a well known fact that sperms are great swimmers. I think it just swam the distance from the male shark to the lady shark. I was born the same way. My mom had me while my dad was in vietnam. And "little" me had to swim across the ocean like the salmon swimming home. Oddly enough thou, I'm not a great swimmer.

  7. an idea by pretzel_logic · · Score: 5, Funny

    This is a milestone. Slashdot is the first to have proof to answer the oldest question.

    What came first; the chicken or the egg?

    now we can all say, the hermaphrodite chicken!!, lol

    --

    pretzel_logic
  8. Did they have a visitor by Lars+T. · · Score: 4, Funny

    named Troy McClure?

    --

    Lars T.

    To the guy who modded me down from perfect to terrible Karma - Apple haters still suck