Snake With 2 Heads Found In Rare Discovery

A man has discovered a rare snake with two heads while clearing out his girlfriend's house in Clay Center, Nebraska.

Joshua Marshall was cleaning his girlfriend's garden on Sept. 4 when he spotted what he assumed were two garter snakes. However, when he looked closely, he realized it was one snake with two heads.

"It took me a second, but then I realized it was two heads on one snake," Marshall told local outlet Norfolk Daily News.

He carefully picked up the reptile and put it in a jar.

Taking to Facebook, Marshal shared some pictures of the rare creature.

"I should add it was alive and well when turned over," he wrote.

Marshall and his girlfriend then reached out to the area's conservation officer, who allegedly refused to take the snake.

"I called him, and he said, 'I don't want it, but I'm going to bet that UNL [University of Nebraska-Lincoln] does,'" he said, as per the local outlet.

After searching online, Marshall found the contact details of Dennis Ferraro, a resident reptile expert at the UNL's Department of Natural Resources. Ferraro informed Marshall that he was on a field trip in southwest Nebraska and could pick up the snake before heading home to Lincoln.

Ferraro described the double-headed snake as a rare discovery, adding that he's seen only a few in his 40 years of career as a herpetologist. He further revealed that it had undergone a different mutation, considering that it was divided directly at the back of its heads. Moreover, the snake had two distinct necks, making it even rarer.

"Each head is acting independently," Ferraro explained, as per the outlet. "Each head opens its mouth. Each head tries to go in a different direction. But it's not really moving very much, because one head starts to go one way, and the other head starts to go the other way, and it's a draw."

The snake was presumably less than 10 days old and would not have survived in the wild for long. It was moved to the lab, where it currently remains safe.

Ferraro hinted at aggregation mating as the cause behind the mutation. Aggregation mating takes place when a female snake mates with multiple male snakes at the same time.