Yesterday I posted a story about a "one-footed snake." In response, Kingdom Studies provided links to four photos, two of which are embedded above, of a snake caught in Davie County, North Carolina, last year.
I presume the mechanism is the same as I postulated yesterday. As best I can tell, the underside of the feet face toward the head of the snake, consistent with the way snakes swallow their prey head-first. It's interesting that in this case and the one with one foot protruding there is an adjacent swelling - presumably a partial herniation of some of the intestine.
Photo credit Jeff Parrish.
Interesting indeed!
ReplyDeleteWhat I keep going back to is the account in Genesis, after Adam and Eve eat the forbidden fruit, God curses them, but also the snake: on your belly you will go, eating the dust. Apparantly before the serpent seduced the humans, it had feet. I'm actually a little disappointed that this isn't some sort of genetic oddity...throwback?...in the evolutionary development with surpressed memories from the past by humans who explain the change w/myth.
ReplyDeletethis isn't a case of the foot sticking out of the snake. The snake actually has legs. This has been known to happen before. Snakes carry vestigial genes for legs but these genes are "switched off" - the control genes for them are not present so they do not express themselves - however a mutation can cause them to show up again.
ReplyDeletethis isn't a case of the foot sticking out of the snake. The snake actually has legs. This has been known to happen before. Snakes carry vestigial genes for legs but these genes are "switched off" - the control genes for them are not present so they do not express themselves - however a mutation can cause them to show up again.
ReplyDeleteI want it!
ReplyDelete