Scientists have overlooked the snake clitoris, until now

A female death adder has a bifurcated clitoris, known as the hemiclitores. In a new paper, scientists provide the first proper scientific description of the hemiclitores in female snakes and say the organs contain nerves and erectile tissue, suggesting they serve a reproductive function and are not merely vestigial. (Photo: Luke Allen/ The New York Times)

NEW YORK: You’ve probably seen a snake’s forked tongue, but it’s not the slithering animal’s only forked body part. Male snakes sport forked genitals called hemipenes that look a bit like pink cactuses and often have spines to match.

What’s good enough for him is good enough for her in the suborder Serpentes. In a paper published Wednesday in the Proceedings of the Royal Society B, scientists provide the first proper scientific description of the hemiclitores, or a bifurcated clitoris in female snakes.