There are a lot of unusual things in the
animal world which we don’t really notice, especially if they’re really not
that obvious. However, some things are just too strange to miss out.
A gynandromorph is any animal that contains both male and female characteristics.
A very common example would be with birds. Amongst cardinals (Cardinalis
cardinalis), the ones with gynandromorphy would have half bright red and half
light gray or brown bodies. Normally, a
male cardinal has bright red feathers that make them stand out from the
females.
Gynandromorphy is a very rare case. You’d
be really lucky to spot one of these birds. Larry Ammann, a University of Texas
statistics professor, was very fortunate to take pictures of this specimen in
his own backyard. He took a few photos of the bird but it flew away right
after.
Basically, there was a genetic mishap that
happened during the cell division in the fertilized ovum, resulting to one side
to have male characteristics and the other female. As the bird developed in the
egg, each of the sides continued to develop as male and female. Since cardinals
have very striking difference between male and female specimens, gynandromorphy
is very obvious amongst them.
Another thing that Ammann noticed about the
bird is that it doesn’t sing or make sounds like the other cardinals. He’d hear
the other birds chirping but the gynandromorph won’t make a sound. He also
noticed that the other male cardinals would chase it away from their territory
while the females don’t seem to be concerned by it.
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