In the animal kingdom, it is truly the survival of the ‘fittest’. Cheyenne McCray investigates the interesting mating behaviors of five different animals.
Porcupine Preferring to live in solitude, female porcupines are indifferent to male porcupines for most of the year. When mating season commences, however, the female porcupine has a special way of showing her interest: watersports. The female will sit high in a tree, urinate, and then rub her genitals on nearby objects. Attracted to the pheromones present in the odor of the female’s urine, the male porcupine will climb the female’s tree. Sitting below the female on a lower branch for some time, the male will fight off other male suitors who may also have been attracted by her urine. Eventually, when he feels the time is right, the male will make his move by climbing next to the female and urinating on her. This act helps trigger the female porcupine’s breeding cycle. Once this is done, they descend from the tree and mate on the ground.
Cheyenne McCray is studying for an MSc in Science Communication
Flatworms Flatworms are hermaphrodites, meaning they have both sperm-producing testes as well as egg-producing ovaries. How do they mate you ask? Through ‘penis fencing’ of course. Penis fencing is a mating behavior that involves two flatworms attempting to stab one another using their dagger-like penises. Each penis consists of two sharply pointed heads which extend from the flatworms’ bodies, ready for ‘battle’. When a flatworm successfully stabs its opponent, it injects sperm directly into the others haemocoel (main body cavity). This is known as traumatic insemination. The flatworm that is successfully stabbed becomes the ‘female’, responsible for laying eggs.
IMAGE: national geographic
www.isciencemag.co.uk
I, Science
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