Photo credit: Idaho Department of Fish and Game
Theoretically, it shouldn’t have been able to survive past birth. The extra teeth growing out of the mountain lion’s forehead looked like something out of a Ridley Scott film, but somehow it made it a whole year in the wilds of southastern Idaho before a hunter killed it last week.
The Idaho State Journal reported that the cat was taken 12 miles outside of Preston, near the Utah State Line. No one knows the exact cause of the extra teeth, but the most likely scenario has the cougar reabsorbing a conjoined twin in the womb. The sibling’s teeth remained in the living lion’s head as a result of the process.
Experts have also considered the possibility of a teratoma causing the extra teeth. A rare form of tumor, teratomas are composed of normal tissues of the body but in different locations than normal. They can be as simple as extra skin, bone, or hair, or as striking as additional fingers, toes, or eyes.
An injury may have caused the deformity, but the chances are slim according to biologists.
The hunter plans to take the cat to a taxidermist, but the state’s Fish and Game biologists intend to contact the hunter and request it be brought to them for in-depth analyses, including x-rays of its skull. Without the testing, science may never know what caused this literal freak of nature.
“It has all of us scratching our heads,” regional wildlife biologist Zach Lockyer was quoted as saying. “It’s a bizarre situation and a bizarre photo.”