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SEX-starved worm can GIVE HEAD to ITSELF to reproduce

No one to blow? Stab yourself in the head with a penis

Bioboffins have found a species of flatworm, Macrostomum hystrix, that can reproduce by injecting its own head with its sperm.

The spunky self-shagging slitherer is discussed in a paper titled Hypodermic self-insemination as a reproductive assurance strategy that's made it into the Proceedings of the Royal Society B.

The worms are usually just a millimetre in length and are hermaphrodites. They prefer to mate with others of their kind.

If isolated, however, the worms can decide to go it alone and inject their heads with their a penis-like organ called the “stylet” that employs a kind of hypodermic action to get the job done.

Stylets aren't gentle: they wound their target in order deliver their genetic payloads.

The boffins behind the research appear to have known about the flatworm's self-reproductive practices for a while, if this 2012 blog post is any indication.

The new observation has given the world a creature that is truly f*cked in the head, albeit for the best possible Darwinian reasons. ®

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