Birth of two-headed tortoise with four front legs baffles experts

The birth of two-headed tortoise with four front legs has left experts baffled as it may be the first ever of its kind.

An African spurred tortoise would already be a prized animal as the species is considered to be in a vulnerable state, but one with double the normal amount of heads and forward legs is an incredible find.

Born on 1 August into the care of Ruben van Schoor in the Netherlands, the little tortoise was born with two heads and four front legs.

The two-headed tortoise has been nicknamed Sorte, which means 'luck' in Portuguese, and it certainly is a rare and perhaps unique animal.

It's also very lucky that it's a tortoise with two heads rather than appearing to be two conjoined tortoise, which bodes well for the reptile's chances of leading a long and happy life.

Newsflash

Reptile expert Sandra Vink said the two-headed tortoise was 'very rare' and especially so with this breed of tortoise.

She said: "As far as the owner knows, it's the first one in the world. It is very uncommon. We've found few cases in media. Usually they do not have long to live.

"Often the animals have a complete second organ system, also with two hearts, and they are very sensitive to diseases. It has a good chance of surviving because it looks like it has one heart, one gastrointestinal tract.

"This means it's actually one animal with two heads. If it would have been a Siamese twin, it would have a bigger chance of getting sick and if one of the parts would die, the other would too. This is what we have seen through the CT scan - so good news for Sorte."

Sorte's heads better get used to sharing a shell as the African spurred tortoise can life for 150 years and spends the first 15 of that growing in size.

Newsflash

Vink explained that there shouldn't be much reason why Sorte wouldn't lead a good life full of munching on nice food.

She continued: "It's very active and eats well. So all signs point to that she can live a long and happy live, because she is cared for very well by her owner.

"In nature, she would not survive on her own. The two heads often don't agree which way to go."

"You often get conjoined twins, with their own organ systems. But because this is one tortoise, you can't really speak of that."

Here's hoping Sorte has a long and happy life of the heads getting along with each other.

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