Picture Question: What's special about this shark?

(It's Dollymix-relevant, promise)

OK so it's a stand-in shark, but they all look the same to me - don't you find? The answer is it gave birth without the help of a male. In only the second documented case of asexual reproduction in sharks (not saying Jesus was definitely a shark but...), a pup carried by a female blacktip shark in a Virginia aquarium contained no genetic material from a male. (Also, it was a pup!)

Demian Chapman, a shark expert, said: "It is quite possible that this is something female sharks of many species can do on occasion," before adding, "We're going to need a bigger boat."

These asexual births tend to only produce a single infant (going on a sample of... two) while conventional litters can be much larger.

Virgin births are not unusual in nature, and have been observed in various fish, amphibians, reptiles and birds. Who needs men?

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