Via the BBC:
The female [boa] has had not one virgin birth, but actually two, in spite of being housed with and observed to be courted by multiple males.
“All offspring are female. The offspring share only half the mother’s genetic make-up,” he told the BBC.
What is more, the female snake in question has produced offspring the like of which have never been seen before.
The snake has given birth the traditional way—after a healthy dose of semen—in the past. And she was housed with male snakes at the time of her virgin births, proving that “some interaction with a male is required,” says biologist Dr. Warren Booth. “However, why she does not utilise his sperm is at present unknown.”
L.E.S.B.I.A.N. snake!
Mother Ouroboros, We Beseech Thee…
But, Dr Booth adds, “this study tells us we have much more to learn when it comes to reproduction in these primitive reptiles”.
Bahahah, primitive? Seems they’re out-evolving us. I sense some hurt sperm-having-scientist egos ^_^
She did not denounce males, she disdained them.
*facepalm* Took half a dozen comments on another site before the “I wish all women could do this, would save us a lot of child support” crack. I guess six is … um … good.
An ominous sign for straight males of all species.
@4: Detests? Despises? Disregards? Damns?
At first glance I read this as “Lady Gaga Denounces Males, Gives Birth to Clones “, and decided that would be an awesome story.
Actually, all sexually reproducing species have the capacity to reproduce asexually, but it has not been observed outside of the laboratory in mammals. Reptiles and sharks seem to do this more commonly.
But, as to the extrapolation that this somehow makes males potentially irrelevant, that is nonsense. Species that asexually reproduce commonly are far more vulnerable to all myriad form of pathogens; if a sexually reproducing species were to reproduce asexually for a significant period of time, they would also be observed to be dying easily of common diseases.
And, more to the point, any children, male or female, this snake had produced with “a healthy dose of semen” are likely to be stronger, more viable, and with greater immune-defense than those produced by parthenogenesis.
I don’t see how this validates anything to be found in separatist feminism.