A two-headed snake has been found in Korea. A 75-year-old farmer, identified by his surname Hwang, found the snake while working in an apple orchard in the North Gyeongsang Province Wednesday.
“The snake was different from any other ones. I found out that it was a Dione’s Rat-snake that had two heads on one body,” said Hwang. Dione’s Rat-snakes typically have a body 60 to 70 centimeter long and they inhabit a wide range of ecosystems and landscapes. Therefore, Diones rat-snakes have different color patterns depending on their living environment.
Hwang said that it had yellowish red band across the 20 cm body. He described the snakes as the most “rare” looking; it not only had two heads, but the right head was bigger than the other one.
Two-headed snakes are born from an adult snake giving birth to twins. In human, these conditions are called conjoined twins. When a developing embryo begins to split into identical twins but stops parting in the process, it leaves the twin with two heads and one conjoined body.
The snake has two separate heads with two functioning brains. This may look fantastic for humans, but having two heads is not good for the snake. It has almost zero chance of survival in the wild.
For further check, the snake was sent to Professor Park Dae-shik at Kangwon National University. After a quick analysis of the snake, he said, “The two heads differ in size because the body is supplying more nutrients to the right one.”
In Korea, most prefer these snakes as, “nuruk” because they have strip-pattern of white and yellow around their bodies like nuruk alcoholic beverages.