{"id":116492,"date":"2020-12-01T04:22:56","date_gmt":"2020-12-01T12:22:56","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/2020\/12\/in-an-unexpected-twist-it-turns-out-alligators-can-regrow-their-tails-too"},"modified":"2020-12-01T04:22:56","modified_gmt":"2020-12-01T12:22:56","slug":"in-an-unexpected-twist-it-turns-out-alligators-can-regrow-their-tails-too","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/2020\/12\/in-an-unexpected-twist-it-turns-out-alligators-can-regrow-their-tails-too","title":{"rendered":"In an Unexpected Twist It Turns Out Alligators Can Regrow Their Tails Too"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><a class=\"aligncenter blog-photo\" href=\"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog.images\/in-an-unexpected-twist-it-turns-out-alligators-can-regrow-their-tails-too.jpg\"><\/a><\/p>\n<p>Well\u2026 it seems we can still be surprised. \ud83d\ude03<\/p>\n<hr>\n<p>Cornered by a dangerous predator, a gecko can self-amputate its still twitching tail, creating a fleeting moment of distraction \u2014 a chance for the lizard to flee with its life.<\/p>\n<p>Small reptiles such as <a href=\"https:\/\/www.sciencealert.com\/gecko-tails-could-help-fix-human-spine-injuries\">geckos<\/a> and <a href=\"https:\/\/doi.org\/10.1038\/s41598-019-55231-6\">skinks<\/a> are well known for this remarkable ability to sacrifice and then rapidly regrow their tails. Now, to scientists\u2019 surprise, it turns out that much larger alligators can regrow theirs too. But only while they\u2019re young.<\/p>\n<p>Juvenile <a href=\"https:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/American_alligator\">American alligators<\/a> (<em>Alligator mississippiensis<\/em>) can regrow up to 18 percent of their total body length back. This is about 23 cm or 9 inches of length.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Well\u2026 it seems we can still be surprised. \ud83d\ude03 Cornered by a dangerous predator, a gecko can self-amputate its still twitching tail, creating a fleeting moment of distraction \u2014 a chance for the lizard to flee with its life. Small reptiles such as geckos and skinks are well known for this remarkable ability to sacrifice [\u2026]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":609,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[20],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-116492","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-futurism"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/116492","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/609"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=116492"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/116492\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=116492"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=116492"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=116492"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}