heredity and evolution

 

Like mammals, duck-billed platypus is warm-blooded (al ata low average temperature of 30–32◦C) with a four-chambered

heart, produces milk for nursing through abdominal glandular patches (not nipples), and has a furry coat. But, like reptiles, the platypus has a single cloaca vestibule that opens to the intestine, exocrine ducts and genital tubules (hence its ordinal name Monotremata). It also has an elaborate venom production mechanism on its hind limbs that delivers potent snake-like venom to intruders through a bony spur. Like birds, the platypus has webbed feet and a bill superficially like a duck, lacks adult teeth, lay eggs and incubates them to hatching.

The platypus has attributes of mammals, birds and reptiles all wrapped together.