An image purports to show a unique seven-headed snake discovered in Honduras. Polycephaly (having several heads) is a phenomenon that many different kinds of animals (most notably snakes and turtles) display on occasion, and it is unique enough that discoveries of polycephalic creatures typically become the topic of news reports.
Polycephalic animals, in general, fare poorly (particularly in the wild) and have very short life spans, while two-headed snakes have been recorded to survive long enough to breed and live out typical lifespans.
Cases of bicephaly/dicephaly (two-headedness) are infrequent, while tricephaly (three-headedness) is extremely unusual. As far as we know, no living creatures born with more than three heads have ever been recorded, making the seven-headed snake depicted above a headline-grabbing anomaly if true.
The image, however, is simply a computer manipulation of an earlier digital alteration, the latter of which circulated in early 2012 as a photograph of a considerably more credible (though similarly phony) three-headed snake discovered in India. A Photoshopped rendition of an original photograph of a single-headed snake.
