Saturday, April 27, 2019

Half And Half...!

Sometimes nature throws out a surprise or two, just to keep us on our toes. This article from Listverse shows a great example of that.

The Half-Sider Cardinal



Photo credit: Live Science

In 2019, Shirley Caldwell from Pennsylvania photographed a cardinal. Although males are red, the females have tan bodies. This one was split down the middle: The right side was red, and the left was tan. The bird was half male, half female.

Experts call such animals bilateral gynandromorphs (aka “half-siders”). These two-toned wonders also show up in butterfly and crustacean species. This cardinal probably split due to a chromosomal mix-up early in its development.

It is believed that half-siders are formed when an egg cell contains two nuclei instead of one. Each develops as a different gender and results in a perfectly halved chick.The cardinal probably cannot sing, which is something only the males can do. However, it might raise a family as a female. As its left side is female, fertile eggs could happen. This is because only the left ovary in birds actually works. Indeed, the photographer noticed that a male cardinal courted the half-sider as if it were fully female.

I never heard of this before, and I found it very interesting. Nature sure knows how to blow our collective minds from time to time, I'd say.

Coffee out on the patio where it's already feeling like Summer.

9 comments:

Gorges Smythe said...

Strange!

Mamahen said...

Wow...I've never heard of this.

bigfoot said...

Does it have it's own special bathroom?

Momlady said...

How strange.

Rob said...

The varieties of life in nature never stop!

HermitJim said...

Hey Gorge...
It certainly is that!
Thanks for coming over this morning!


Hey Mamahen...
Like I said, nature is full of surprises.
Thanks for stopping by today!


Hey Bigfoot...
I would imagine it's just a case of "if you gotta go, you go".
Thanks for the visit today!


Hey Momlady...
Certainly different.
Thanks for the visit today!

HermitJim said...

Hey Rob...
Always changing, mostly for the best.
Thanks for coming by this morning!

JO said...

This picture has been going around alot lately, but not the explaination. Thanks for sharing this one.

See you all on the patio we hit 97 yesterday but breezy so it wasn't to bad

Dizzy-Dick said...

I have heard of some people being half and half, but this is the first bird I ever heard of that was that way. Nature plays tricks on us all. . .