Meanwhile in crazy animal news…
A female stingray (named Charlotte) is pregnant at an aquarium in North Carolina, but there’s a twist: There’s no males. And now the aquarium is determined to figure out … well … what the hell is going on.
Located 103 miles west of Charlotte, Hendersonville’s The Aquarium and Shark Lab by Team Ecco say that the stingray is expecting to give birth to pups, but they have no earthly idea how, which has them thinking: Could this be a result of a male shark? Wait, a shark?
Yeah, a shark. A white-spot bamboo shark to be exact.
With this rare pregnancy, there are two explanations to what’s going on, with one of them being the shark.
Animals, with stingrays being one of the top ones, are able to reproduce asexually when that species is lacking reproduction, according to research, per the USA Today. (RELATED: Elite Catch: 1,000-Pound Great White Shark Caught By Fisherman Off Miami Beach)
Originally, the stingray’s swelling alerted the Hendersonville aquarium into believing she might have had cancer, they told FOX Carolina. To further investigate, they took her in for an ultrasound, eventually being revealed that her swelling were actually eggs — Charlotte is pregnant!
But how?
Besides the asexual reproduction explanation, the aquarium believes that a shark might have gotten the stingray pregnant because of bite marks that were found on Charlotte — bite marks are a common sign of mating sharks. Two young white-spot bamboo sharks were placed into the stingray’s tank back in July 2023.
“We have definitive video of the most current ultrasound showing two if not three pups,” the aquarium told FOX Carolina. “DNA will need to be done after the pups’ birth — unless we have visual cues about a mixed breed.”
Team Ecco also says that Charlotte will be giving birth soon.
Stingray in North Carolina aquarium may have been impregnated by a SHARK – and is now set to have ‘malicious birth’ with no mate https://t.co/P8XMWg2sKN pic.twitter.com/pY6zP81RGV
— Daily Mail US (@DailyMail) February 11, 2024
New species of animal? … Stay tuned, ladies and gentlemen.