A two-headed alligator from Seminole Heights is a fantasy urban patron with a claim to realism (7 photos)

This bizarre character has unexpectedly become a beloved mascot for a Tampa neighborhood.





An unusually strange, yet utterly Florida creature serves as the emblem of Tampa's Seminole Heights neighborhood.



When the suburb was first developed in 1911, its founder used the area's emblem in advertising materials - a two-headed alligator with its jaws wide open. The bizarre image came from old Florida folklore.





That Famous Photo

In a story collected by historians R. Lopez and A. L. Perez for the Writers' Project in 1929, a rabbit teases an alligator in the Hillsborough River. An old turtle warns, "Keep away from that alligator, rabbit. He'll bite or punch you." The rabbit ignores the wise turtle with her useful advice, teases the predator by dangling her paws in front of his mouth, and suddenly discovers that the alligator really does have not one head, but two, and both are full-fledged with a full set of sharp teeth.



The second head swallows the long-eared one, to which the wise turtle thoughtfully remarks: "I told the rabbit that he would either bite or hit."



Polycephalic animals rarely survive

For a long time, the two-headed alligator symbol continued to appear throughout Seminole Heights, with new stories coming to light. In 2014, Tampa resident Justin Arnold was walking his dog through the mangroves at a local park when he allegedly came across an alligator with two heads, calmly lying on the shore. A photo of the creature was published in the Tampa Bay Times the following day. The authenticity of the photo was immediately questioned, but a restaurant in Seminole Heights now has a taxidermied alligator (allegedly real) with two heads on display. The establishment claims that this is the specimen that was captured on camera.



To be fair, it should be noted that such a phenomenon as polycephalic animals is possible. This happens when, in rare cases, the zygote splits only partially. Instead of two fully formed twins, the zygote - the fertilized egg - is divided, forming two embryos with a common body.

Unsuccessful separation of monozygotic twins is common in reptiles and amphibians, but they rarely reach sexual maturity. Most often, such cases are recorded in snakes and turtles. Lambs and piglets are sometimes born with two heads. In very rare cases, this can happen to dogs and cats. The babies die immediately after birth if they are not cared for by people.



Two years later, the symbol showed its two heads again, only this time in a restaurant. Arnold, with the help of a public program, installed a two-headed alligator sculpture almost two meters high in front of the brewery. Its paws are hospitably spread out to the sides, as if trying to embrace the visitor, and both mouths are crookedly smiling, calling on visitors to try the local beer with the telling name "Hit or Bite".