Snake found with clawed hand growing out of it.

[The_Absolute]

http://news.ninemsn.com.au/world/863766/snake-born-with-hand-shocks-scientists

Some kind of genetic mutation perhaps?

[Greg Bernhardt]

I turned on the light and saw this monster working its way along the wall using his claw.

Video would have been amazing. I would have been freaked too!

[Ivan Seeking]

Eh, I don't believe it. Probably a hoax.

The news coming out of China lately is pretty tabloidish, so reader beware.

[Researcher X]

Can't mutations cause any outgrowth potentially? Like, you could find something that looked like a human head growing out of a donkey's backside, but it would just be really really really really really really really really really unlikely for mutations of DNA to be that widespread and specific to give that result. More than likely, if you zap a donkey fetus with radiation it will just develop tumors and die.

[Kronos5253]

Looks like it just ate something to me.. You can see the lump.

[Insanity]

perhaps a case of a vestigial limb mutation? Snake genomes do supposedly contain the instructions for growing a limb.

[Borek]

After dead snake was found, officials said

"We won't know the cause until we've conducted an autopsy"

Well, it was enough to interrogate the murderer:

she then grabbed a shoe and beat the snake to death

[Blenton]

Its just a lizard.

[Dadface]

That particular snake likes to eat little people for his dinner but one of them objected and started to claw his way out.

[arithmetix]

A retrovirus could be involved.
In Australia there are a lot of weird creatures which, seemingly unrelated, are marsupial. In the same country are many variant insects which have wings, unlike their otherwise similar counterparts in New Zealand.

[jim mcnamara]

Snakes have a common lizard ancestor. Some extant snake species have vestigial legs - boas and pythons for example.

Having a "leg" grow is not all that weird considering the ancestry of snakes.

[Moonbear]

Snakes have a common lizard ancestor. Some extant snake species have vestigial legs - boas and pythons for example.

Having a "leg" grow is not all that weird considering the ancestry of snakes.

I was thinking the same. It wouldn't take much of a genetic mutation for a limb to grow. It may be more surprising that it doesn't happen more often.

[arithmetix]

but if I may harp on about the retrovirus idea...
... this is a more credible mechanism for evolution than any other I've heard of.

[hypatia]

I was thinking the same. It wouldn't take much of a genetic mutation for a limb to grow. It may be more surprising that it doesn't happen more often.
But yet something inside me just wants to scream and run.

[Phrak]

Notice to all mutants: Beware or easily frightened normals.

[BigFairy]

well its a reputable news website.. is there any follow up? thx

[Peopleunit]

What, no shadow of the supposed limb?

Obvious fake.

[the_awesome]

I think it's a bit obvious that the snake had ate something beforehand.
"THE ELDERLY WOMAN WAS THAT SCARED SHE BEAT IT TO DEATH!"
That is why this snake looks so deformed!

Any hope of referring to evolution is a complete fail. According to evolution lizards evolved into snakes, so this would be devolution. Not to mention the fact that a whole leg wouldn't form. So its obvious that it's the snakes guts coming out - perhaps it had eaten a lizard?