Mutation or Evolution? The Antlered Doe Mystery
An antlered doe is a female deer that grows antlers because her body carries unusually high androgen levels, most often from an ovarian or adrenal source or an intersex condition. In nearly every deer species this is an endocrine anomaly, not a heritable mutation or an evolutionary trait. Published: June 5, 2026. Last reviewed: June […]
Unusual Mutations: Animals With Extra Limbs
Polymelia is the growth of one or more limbs beyond a species’ normal set. In animals it arises mainly three ways: a parasite that scrambles limb-bud signaling, as Ribeiroia ondatrae does in frogs; incomplete conjoined twinning in mammals; and atypical regeneration after injury, as in branch-armed octopuses. Published: June 5, 2026. Last reviewed: June 5, […]
The Deep-Sea Unknown Off Japan: An Animalia Incertae Sedis Filmed at Depth
By Dr. Wren Ashby · Published May 13, 2026 · Updated May 13, 2026 In April 2026, a paper in Biodiversity Data Journal described a small, pale, bilaterally symmetrical organism that had been filmed gliding above the floor of the Ryukyu Trench at roughly 9,130 meters [1]. The authors, working with the Minderoo-UWA Deep-Sea Research […]
The Curious Case of Two-Headed Snakes
By Dr. Wren Ashby · Published May 7, 2026 · Updated May 13, 2026 The Curious Case of Two-Headed Snakes A two-headed snake is the most photogenic answer to a quiet embryological question: what happens when a single embryo begins to twin and then changes its mind. The condition is called bicephaly, or more precisely […]