Lizards with multiple tails, more common than anyone knew - study

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Lizards that lose and regrow their tails can go overboard and grow back more than one tail — and sometimes they sprout as many as six. Those haywire multiple tails appear a lot more often than you might think, scientists recently discovered.

Numerous reports from around the world mention multi-tailed lizards, and some sightings date to hundreds of years ago. But these cases are typically isolated and scattered, making it difficult to tell how widespread this runaway tail growth really is. 

Now, for the first time, scientists have compiled reports of "abnormal regeneration" in lizard tails, in which lizards that lost their tails grew back two, three or more appendages. To do this, researchers combed through hundreds of records of more than 175 species and spanning more than 400 years; they combined scientific studies with non-peer-reviewed descriptions to create the first global database for sightings of multi-tailed lizards. 

Caudal autonomy is the superpower that enables lizards to wriggle out of predator attacks by detaching their tail, which when severed acts as a decoy.

When the authors of the new study evaluated these and other descriptions and sightings — 425 in all, from 63 countries — they found that this phenomenon isn't rare or unusual. Based on the number of instances of multiple tails they reviewed, the scientists estimated that as many as 3% of lizards worldwide are likely to have extra tails.

"This is quite a surprisingly high number, and it really begins to make us wonder what ecological impacts this could have, especially noting that to the lizard, an extra tail represents a considerable increase in body mass to drag around," said lead study author James Barr.

Source: https://www.livescience.com/lizard-multiple-tails-regeneration.html, https://www.iflscience.com/plants-and-animals/it-turns-out-lizards-dont-just-replace-lost-tails-sometimes-they-grow-extras/

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I'm sorry but this one reminds me of...

... this -

Spoiler

her shoes

 

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They’re called politicians. 

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Best Ted Talk I’ve seen in a while.