Sick and tired of hearing the whining from your single friends about how hard the dating scene is? Had it up to here with your girlfriend wearing her calming facemask to bed and your boyfriend’s total disregard for manscaping? Well maybe we humans should really be thanking our lucky evolutionary stars that our mating rituals are even moderately more advanced than the animals around us.
1. A Frigatebird, aka The Show Off
Photo courtesy of Jasoncorriveau (cc)
Although the female frigatebird is pretty unremarkable looking, the male frigatebird has developed a snazzy way of attracting his Plain Jane counterpart’s eye. During mating season, the male frigatebird can inflate his throat sac into a huge, heart-shaped balloon. He then proceeds to nod his head from side to side and flaps his wings to draw the attention of the surrounding females so the ladies can check out how great he looks.
And if that isn’t enough bragging, he also shields his partner’s eyes during mating to make sure she can’t check out any of the other male birds strutting their enlarged-throat-sac-stuff around her.
These birds can be found on the shores of the Pacific and Indian Oceans and in the South Atlantic Ocean. (But not, surprisingly, on the Jersey Shore.)
2. The Garter Snake, aka The Polyamorous Lover
Garter snakes are independent from birth, but that doesn’t mean the females don’t want a good dose of male attention when mating season rolls around. Once the female garter snake emerges from hibernation and is ready to mate, she releases a pheromone that attracts the male garter snakes; the only problem is they usual come hundreds at a time! The female is totally undiscerning, and usually ends up on the bottom of a squirming, churning “mating ball.”
And to make matters even more complicated, male garter snakes are blessed with two penises, one on either side of their body. Males also occasionally, and for no clear reason, excrete the same pheromone that the females do and find themselves on the bottom of a mating ball … but without the ability to mate. What teases!
Want to spot one of these mating free-for-alls? Garter snakes can be found across North America, from Canada to northern Central America.
