Holy moly.
You do have a Blue-tongue,
but it's got two heads.
Look at that.
What are you going to do?
Down to the vet, hey?
We need an answer to know that he's not in pain or anything like that
and then we'll look after him.
Hey Liz, come check this out.
Oh, wow. You don't see that every day.
Not at all.
A very peculiar looking creature has been handed
into the Australian Reptile Park
receptionist Penny.
We should probably get Tim.
- I'll get Tim. - To have a look, yeah.
- Penny to Tim. - Go ahead Pen.
Hey Tim we have something here for you that you
that you’d probably like to see.
Sounds interesting. What is it?
It's a bit of an odd one.
You’ll probably have to check it out for yourself.
- You're going to freak. - Right’o.
I'll be down in a minute.
This is something I've never seen before.
Tim's definitely going to be excited to see this one.
What have we got?
Hey, I think we've got a bluetongue lizard.
Holy moly.
You do have a bluetongue,
but it's got two heads.
Look at that.
Fair to say, in a long time in zoos, we've never seen that, hey?
Never.
This lizard is a real anomaly.
I mean, there must be a chance of one in a million in the wild
that something like this is born
and for it to have been found alive.
Well, spectacular.
Do you think he's going to grow?
If he's got two independent brains
and he can swallow and his body's alright and then he might live.
It's great that someone found him and recognised that he was different
and has brought him to us.
Things like this in the wild
well, if they're disadvantaged even a little bit, the wild is harsh
and I don't think he would have survived out there.
What are you going to do?
Down to the vet, hey?
We neeed an answer to know that
he's not in pain or anything like that, and then we'll look after him.
Looking at him, physically, he's okay.
But I'm not a vet.
And I guess I really need to know what's going on, on the inside.
I'll take him down now.
I’ll let you know how I go when I get back.
Thanks, Tim.
Pete, the vet he’s in for a surprise. I’ve taken him weird
and wonderful things over the years, but never anything
with two heads.
Good afternoon, guys.
Hello, Tim.
I know I don't have an appointment,
but do you have time for a special little friend of mine?
Tim has arrived at the Green CrossFit Clinic
about 5 minutes from the Australian Reptile Park.
Have you ever seen anything like that?
He's hoping Dr.
Peter Nosworthy
can provide some more clues about this very
unusual two headed bluetongue lizard.
I've never seen a lizard like this before, and I'm worried
about how it's going to survive.
I'm just going to have a look in his mouth for a moment.
- One Blue-tongue. - Everything looks alright in there.
Alright mate
lets have have a look in the other side.
Yeah, okay.
Superficially, from what I can see they both
look normal.
Is it possible that both heads work and swallow and...
I'm sure it is. Yeah.
I mean, I don't see why it couldn't be.
I'd like to take an X-ray of it’s spine to see that it has got,
you know, something that runs from back of
one of its heads down to
then through until the tail.
X-rays.
I would then like to pass a tube down both mouths
to see which one goes down to the stomach or whether they both do
out of interest
and see which one we should be feeding.
Or can we feed both?
Okay.
What have you got? One or two brains?
I think we have only got one brain Tim.
- One brain two heads. - One brain.
It's not a bad thing.
And the rest of the body looks healthy?
- Normal. - Normal.
Wow.
Normal from two heads backwards he’s normal.
The X-rays are done
and Pete's happy.
But what he wants to see now is what actually happens when he puts
a tube down the throat. Do both mouths
feed through to the stomach?
- Mouth open. - Mouth open.
Pete puts the tube down one side and it feeds back to the belly.
He then goes to the other head and it does the same.
Now that means both mouths are intact and working.
- Okay. - So that's good.
He can swallow both sides.
Both sides will run down into the abdomen.
It's a great result
but before Tim leaves, there's one more thing
that needs to be addressed.
What are you going to call him?
How about Janice?
Janice?
Yeah, it was the Roman god of new beginnings.
- He had two faces. - Janice?
Janice, yeah.
Well, that's lovely.
One lizard, one brain with two heads.
Janice?
I love it. I'm going to take him home.
Try and get him feeding, get him strong, and hopefully
he can live a normal life.
Well, that's his home, at least for the next little while,
until he gets established and starts eating and gets bigger and stronger.
Tim is helping Janice the Blue-tongue lizard
to settle into his new home at the Australian Reptile Park.
I don't know if he's ever eaten since he was born,
so I'm actually going to try and just force a little bit into him
and maybe that'll give him a taste for it.
And tomorrow or the days to come, it'll stimulate him to start
feeding by himself.
C’mon little mate.
I'm just going to gently pry open his mouth.
Just put a bit in.
Just a little bit of food in there.
That's it. Good boy.
He's eating it.
He's licking it.
That's fantastic. He knows what to do.
Good boy. Let's try head number two.
Same again.
That's a good fella.
When I was down at the vet, Pete said
he's got a good response in the mouth.
He sure does.
He's following that food from both heads.
The last thing I'm going to do is actually try a little cricket.
That’s it. Mouth’s open.
Cricket’s in. Look at that.
He's eating. Beautiful.
In the wild
he wouldn't have survived.
At least here we can give him a chance.
It'll be a good little home for you, mate.
You got everything you need in there.