Twins at Conspicuously Different Developmental Stages in a Turtle Egg

One-egg twins, in general, initiate embryonic development at the same time, and their developmental stages proceed in parallel. Here we report a rare case of the embryonic development of the red-eared slider turtle, Trachemys scripta, in which twins at conspicuously different developmental stages developed on a single yolk. One of the twins appeared to have developed at the normal developmental rate, whereas the development of the other was markedly delayed, despite the absence of any overt anomalies. This observation suggests uncoupled or fully independent differential regulation of embryonic development from either a single or, more likely, two distinct pluripotent blastoderms sharing the same yolk and same environmental conditions.