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Officials at a Louisiana aquarium are investigating the mystery of a swell shark baby that hatched despite its mother having no contact with male sharks for at least three years.
The Shreveport Aquarium said members of its husbandry team were shocked when they spotted an egg in the swell shark tank about eight months ago. Advertisement
Officials said the tank holds only two female sharks, and neither has had any contact with a male shark in at least three years.
The female pup hatched Jan. 3 and was dubbed Yoko by keepers.
Experts have posited two potential theories for the unusual hatching: parthenogenesis or delayed fertilization.
Parthenogenesis occurs when a female animal reproduces asexually, essentially creating an exact duplicate of itself. This is what was determined to have happened when a female zebra shark at Chicago’s Shedd Aquarium hatched an egg without any male contact in 2022.
Delayed fertilization has also been documented in sharks before, and refers to when an egg becomes fertilized an unusually long time after mating.
The aquarium said DNA testing will be performed once Yoko is large enough for a blood draw and will determine whether parthenogenesis or delayed fertilization occurred. Advertisement
“This situation is incredible and shows the resilience of this species,” Greg Barrick, curator of live animals at Shreveport Aquarium, said in a news release. “We are very excited in the coming months to confirm whether this was indeed a case of parthenogenesis or if it was delayed fertilization. It really proves that ‘life, uh… finds a way.'”
