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Rare half female, half male bird spotted by University of Otago zoologist
- blueflow 3y agohalf female, half male phenotype.
- OJFord 3y agoThat makes it sound like it's highly technical and uninteresting - on a completely layman level even it's pretty fascinating, there's a photo, it's split right down the middle with one colour (each apparently as would be expected from the male or female bird) each side!
- saalweachter 3y ago? > “The phenomenon arises from an error during female cell division to produce an egg, followed by double-fertilization by two sperm,” he explains. The bird is a chimera, with a different genome on each side of its body, one male (ZZ), one female (ZW).
- blueflow 3y ago... and they determined that from a photo?
- pryce 3y agoIt's less difficult than you think. Tetragametic chimeras for half-sider budgerigars have different genomes on either side, and the mechanism they occur by is through fusion of two distinct embryos with different DNA[1] Given we know the phenotype of this Green Honeycreeper has a male half and a female half, and given how incredibly likely that the mechanism is following established ways that chimeras occur, it is not hard to say with confidence that the male and female halves of the observed bird are almost certain to have distinct genotypes. Put another way, it would be a much more radical hypothesis that "this halfsider bird with two distinct sexes would not be a chimera." Obviously we'd ideally wish to collect DNA samples from each side of the bird [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Half-sider_budgerigar https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Half-sider_budgerigar
- saalweachter 3y agoThe interesting part to me is that it's described -- in birds -- as an error in female cell division, rather than the fusion of two embryos. That implies that there are no same-sex chimera birds running around undetected.
- SAI_Peregrinus 3y agoIt's not the first bilateral gynandromorph bird found, though it.may be the first for this species.
- deleted 3y ago[deleted]
- boxed 3y agoI mean... we know how biology works? So...
- jojobas 3y agoChimera is normally an organism formed by two normally fertilized fetuses fusing together. They've made goat/sheep chimerae, crazy stuff.
- tetris11 3y agocaused by a half male and half female.... conplete it with me...
- simiones 3y agoIt sounds like it's a chimera, so there's actually a half male half female genotype (or rather, a full male genotype in half the body and a full female genotype in the other part).
- guerrilla 3y agoI thought they meant hermaphrodite but then saw the picture. They mean luterally half, right down the middle.
- CWuestefeld 3y agoIt seems like a lot of people want to jump in and start making political points, before taking time to read the article.
- andsoitis 3y ago> I thought they meant hermaphrodite The case in the article is gynandromorphism. Intersex is not necessarily a form of gynandromorphism. Intersex refers to individuals who have biological characteristics that don't fit neatly into the two biological sexes of male and female. This can include variations in chromosomes, gonads, hormones, or genitals. Gynandromorphism is a specific type of chimera, where the individual has both male and female tissues distributed in a mosaic pattern. This typically happens due to an error during early embryonic development. Occurs mainly in species of animals with strong sexual dimorphism. In some cases, intersex individuals might have features resembling gynandromorphism, but usually it is more subtle variation in sex characteristics rather than a mosaic pattern of male and female traits.
- guerrilla 3y agoI'm not sure why you're trying to tell me about intersex. I was talking about hermaphroditism like in earthworms and snails.
- thfuran 3y ago>Occurs mainly in species of animals with strong sexual dimorphism Occurs or is noticed?
- andsoitis 3y agoI’ll just quote Wikipedia directly: “Gynandromorphism has been noted in Lepidoptera (butterflies and moths) since the 1700s.[1][2][3] It has also been observed in crustaceans, such as lobsters and crabs, in spiders,[4] ticks,[5] flies,[6] locusts,[7] crickets,[8] dragonflies,[9] ants,[10][11] termites,[12] bees,[13] lizards,[14] snakes,[15] rodents,[16][17] and birds.[18][19][20][21][22] It is generally rare but reporting depends on ease of detecting it (whether a species is strongly sexually dimorphic) and how well-studied a region or organism is. For example, up until 2023 gynandromorphism had been reported in more than 40 bird species, but the vast majority of these are from the Palearctic and Nearctic, indicating that it likely is underreported in parts of the world that are not as biologically well-studied.”
- sertbdfgbnfgsd 3y ago[flagged]
- meiraleal 3y ago[flagged]
- sertbdfgbnfgsd 3y ago[flagged]
- asylteltine 3y agoWhich we can all agree is both cool and a biological anomaly… much like it can happen in humans.
- networkchad 3y ago[dead]
- CWuestefeld 3y agoYou should probably read the article first, before jumping into politics: “This particular example of bilateral gynandromorphy – male one side and female the other – shows that, as in several other species, either side of the bird can be male or female. “The phenomenon arises from an error during female cell division to produce an egg, followed by double-fertilization by two sperm,” he explains.
- novemp 3y ago[dead]
- HarHarVeryFunny 3y agoI'm not sure if it could happen in humans, but apparently it has never been observed. This phenomena is called bilateral gynandromorphism and is where the entire body shows both male and female traits (along a bilateral split). You're probably thinking of hermaphrodites (e.g. she-males) which is where the animal only has reproductive organs of both sexes.
- simiones 3y agoChimerism exists in humans as well, and likely gynandromorphism as well. I don't think this bilateral version has ever been seen, but more subtle forms may be more common than assumed - it can only really be discovered through genetic testing of different parts of the body.
- NikkiA 3y agoIt can, and does, I used to know a bilateral chimera, you could clearly tell which side was which by hair colour, she identified as female. Btw, 'she-male' a) does not refer to hermaphrodites, b) is an offensive term, and has been considered offensive for around 30 years, so no 'modern wokism' retort required.
- sigzero 3y agoCool looking bird
- philk10 3y agoThere was also a Cardinal like this in Pennsylvania a couple of years ago - https://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-56189600 https://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-56189600
- tromp 3y ago> captured on film The article makes no further mentions of actual film, so presumably the phrase now also applies to digital photography?!
- rsynnott 3y agoYep; English tends to hold onto these archaic references. People also still talk about getting things on tape etc.
- willcipriano 3y agoBack when things were on tape they would still call it film.
- eatonphil 3y agoWhen I listen to an audiobook on my phone it feels natural to say I'm listening to the book on tape.
- matt-attack 3y agoWe’ll also still dial a phone number despite dials being gone for a half-century.
- libraryatnight 3y agoWe see this sort of thing in computer icons, too. People who have never seen a real floppy but recognize it as a "save" icon. It's kind of neat how this evolves.
- calamari4065 3y agoSame way you still dial a phone or roll up a window.
- grogenaut 3y agoThe window is still going up via the same rolling mechanism there's just a motor doing it. Source I replaced my window motor and regulator this month
- mbfg 3y agoTo me, the bilateralness is the super cool part. I imagine that this happens more often, but you just don't notice from a visual inspection.
- retrac 3y agoThere are multiple possible causes, but one is a phenomenon known as genetic mosaicism. That is when an organism is made up of multiple distinct genetic lineages, in species where this isn't typical. It can occur from things like twins merging in the womb, or from a stem cell in the embryo mutating and all its descendants being a little different. In humans (or birds) it often shows up in stripes (related to the basic developmental segments of the vertebrate animals) or indeed, bilateral. For a rather visible example: it is sometimes the cause of heterochromatic (different colour) eyes.
- bewaretheirs 3y agoAnd sometimes it can result in DNA test results showing that children are not related to their mother, if when you swab the mother you don't get the same lineage as the one that developed into her ovaries: https://embryo.asu.edu/pages/case-lydia-fairchild-and-her-chimerism-2002 https://embryo.asu.edu/pages/case-lydia-fairchild-and-her-ch...
- solardev 3y agoWhat happens when it wants to mate?
- mynameisnoone 3y agoBilateral gynandromorphs tend to be infertile. https://www.livescience.com/64831-cardinal-gynandromorph.html https://www.livescience.com/64831-cardinal-gynandromorph.htm...
- solardev 3y agoI was more wondering about their behavior, like do they try to seek out mates? Are they attractive to non-gynandromorph birds? Do they physically attempt intercourse? > but this one may actually be fertile as the left side is female, and only the left ovary in birds is functional It's really fascinating!
- k__ 3y agoMitosis
- anon115 3y agomeow meow meow meow XDD
- deleted 3y ago[deleted]
- kgwxd 3y agoIt has good news and bad news https://youtu.be/4LVi-oNWgc8?feature=shared https://youtu.be/4LVi-oNWgc8?feature=shared
- libraryatnight 3y agoMother nature's a maaaaad scientist, Jerry! This is really cool, I think I found my lunchtime rabbit hole to read more about.
- orand 3y agoWon't somebody please think of the gametes?
- lukeaf 3y agoThe real question is what is a "Sesquicentennial Distinguished Professor"?
- pimlottc 3y agoFrom what I can gather, it's a special title at the University of Otago. It means he was received the standard title of Distinguished Professor [0] as part of a special group of appointments made to celebrate the university's 150th anniversary in 2019. [1] 0: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Distinguished_professor https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Distinguished_professor 1: https://www.otago.ac.nz/otagobulletin/news/poutoko-taiea-distinguished-chair-appointments-announced2 https://www.otago.ac.nz/otagobulletin/news/poutoko-taiea-dis...
- drKarl 3y agoWhat are their pronouns?
- leobg 3y agoNot in SF?
- aaroninsf 3y agoShhh no on tell the GOP
- adamthedog 3y agoChimerism is a whole lot of fun. Realistically, there are loads of humans with portions of their body differing pretty significantly in genes just due to somatic cell mutations during early development (not just standard zygote-fusing), right? Sure, most of these changes would still be nearly imperceptible, but maybe some day whole-genome sequencing will be cheap enough that the true frequency of mosaicism can be studied by yoinking cells from all over one's body. In the mean time, the intentional 'chimerization' of plants via grafting is pretty interesting too. Adam's Laburnum is a very visually striking example somewhat akin to this bird, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/%2B_Laburnocytisus_%27Adamii%27 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/%2B_Laburnocytisus_%27Adamii%2... sporting both yellow and coral-pink flowers, though the bilateral nature of the bird's mosaicism is what's really special.