A living two-headed snake is now back on display at a zoo, with visitors left absolutely baffled.
Cameron Park Zoo in Texas said in a Facebook post that the rat snake, with two brains but one body, was found by a family in their garden in 2016.
His two heads – called Pancho and Lefty – give his body "conflicting commands" meaning the snake's movements are "sporadic and uncoordinated". He would have likely died if he were not donated to the zoo.
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The post explained this also means the snake "can easily injure his neck by trying to go in different directions and getting stuck". This happened in February 2021, when he was first taken off display.
The zoo said: "It took until June last year for the wound to fully heal. Now that he has been eating well and the wound has been fully closed for a year, we are excited to put him back out in the freshwater aquarium building."
His new home has been purposefully put together without too many obstacles. The zoo said: "We are hoping that this design provides enough cover for the snake to feel secure while also being physically safe, so he does not injure his neck again."
Speaking to Newsweek, a spokesperson for the zoo said two-headed snakes are "very rare". "It is even less common for them to survive long," they added.
Incredibly, the spokesperson explained the two heads "seem to have different personalities". They said: "The right head is more dominant in terms of feeding and movement. The left head will occasionally eat but it seems to mostly go along with wherever the right head wants to go."
The condition is called polycephaly and occurs following either the incomplete division of an embryo or the incomplete fusion of two embryos.
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