Caution: Non-Human Sexual Relationships

[shereads]

Dr. Tatiana's Sex Advice For All Creation

~ by Olivia Judson

Chapter 1. Let Slip the Whores of War!

excerpt
Boys are promiscuous and girls are chaste, right? Wrong. The battle of the sexes erupts because, in most species, girls are wanton.

Dear Dr. Tatiana,

I'm a stick insect. It is with great embarrassment that I write to you while copulating, but my mate and I have been copulating for ten weeks already. I'm bored to death, but he shows no signs of flagging. How can I get him to quit?

~ Sick of Sex in India

By continually copulating, your mate can guarantee that no one else will have a chance to get near you. It's a good thing he's only half your length, so he's not too heavy to carry about. Your case is extreme, but not unique. Look at the Idaho Ground Squirrel. The male won't let his partner out of his sight, and follows her everywhere. If she goes into a burrow he sits at the entrance so she can't come out - and no one else can go in. Or consider the Blue Milkweed Beetle. After sex, which by any standard is brief, the male insists on riding around on the female's back, not so he can whisper sweet nothings but so he can stop her from gallivanting.

To be frank, males have good reason to be possessive. Given the chance, girls of most species will leap into bed with another fellow. "But wait," I hear you cry. "Isnt' it a general law of nature that males are promiscuous and females are chaste?" That is indeed what used to be thought. But we now know that notion was nonsense. Granted, there are some species where the female mates only once - the alfafa cutter bee. And certainly there are species where males race from one girl to the next so eagerly, they'll fornicate with anything. Goldfish, for example, are occasionally drowned by amorous frogs. But as a general rule, girls are more strumpet than saint. Rather than just mating once, they'll mate with more than one male and often with far, far more males than are necessary to feritilize their eggs.

http://www.amazon.com/gp/reader/0805063323/ref=sib_dp_pt/002-4496931-9737605#reader-link

This book gets even more shocking. Praying mantises eating their mates' heads in a frenzy of religious/sexual fervor. Fruitflies fornicating almost from the moment of their birth. Sex-obsessed, co-dependent rodents...Animals!

~ SR

 

[rgraham666]

And let's not forget aphids, all of whom are female, reproduce by parthenogenisis and are born pregnant. So they don't get any sex at all.

Until the fall when winged males and females are born, mate and lay eggs that winter over and hatch the next spring. All females that start having kids within a day.

There's a near microscopic insect that follows the same basic pattern. Except the young aren't born. They eat their mother until they're strong enough to bust out of her.

These insects live on and eat fungus. They reproduce in this manner until the fungus is almost gone, then winged males and females are born to lay eggs on other patches of fungus.

Ya know, we human beings have it pretty easy when it comes to sex.

 

[Guest]

Sher, thanks! I love this kind of stuff. But, rg, the young eating their way out of mom: wish I'd not read that, even if they are microscopic

Perdita

 

[Clare Quilty]

Dear Goddess in Heaven, let my soul transmigrate into anything but choice #3.

But as a general rule, girls are more strumpet than saint. Rather than just mating once, they'll mate with more than one male and often with far, far more males than are necessary to feritilize their eggs.

This would seem to be dictated by logic even among female humans. A woman who has children by many men decreases the risk that some particular disease or environmental factor will wipe out all of her genetically diverse offspring in one fell swoop.

 

[shereads]

And let's not forget aphids, all of whom are female, reproduce by parthenogenisis and are born pregnant. So they don't get any sex at all.

Wow. That sucks, Rg. The next time I let a batch of ladybugs loose on the aphids in the garden, I'll know I'm doing them all a favor.

Ya know, we human beings have it pretty easy when it comes to sex.

Sex, yes. Reproduction? Nobody trumps marsupials. Their babies are so tiny that Mom doesn't even know she was in labor until she wakes up from her nap and finds a cute little pink guy in flannel jammies, all snuggled up in her apron pocket. When he gets too heavy and her back aches, she can take him out and give him to his aunt for a while.

 

[shereads]

Dear Goddess in Heaven, let my soul transmigrate into anything but choice #3.

I've taken out a contract on my own life, to go into effect if I begin to exhibit the symptoms. Just a thought...

 

[shereads]

Sher, thanks! I love this kind of stuff. But, rg, the young eating their way out of mom: wish I'd not read that, even if they are microscopic

Perdita

It sounds awful, but not half as bad as the description of an episiotomy I heard from a former college roommate. "And then they come after you with these...these garden shears!"

 

[McKenna]

.

 

[Virtual_Burlesque]

"But wait," I hear you cry. "Isn’t' it a general law of nature that males are promiscuous and females are chaste?" ...

HA HA HA!
HEE HEE HEE!
HAW HAW HAW!
HO HO HO!

That's the FUNNIEST thing I have ever heard!

And let's not forget aphids, all of whom are female, reproduce by parthenogenesis and are born pregnant. So they don't get any sex at all....

So THAT's how the misbegotten Religious Right [TM] get their begatting begotten!

I always thought the female preying mantis had a good idea. She has to put out (see above) but at least he has to give head, too!

 

[lucky-E-leven]

I've taken out a contract on my own life, to go into effect if I begin to exhibit the symptoms. Just a thought...

http://www.addis-welt.de/smilie/smilie/lachen/12.gif

 

[Guest]

Re: Re: Caution: Non-Human Sexual Relationships

Actually, this applies to more than just the ground squirrel here in Idaho; I've known several human males who behave the same way.

Yeah, my first husband was a ground squirrel type.

Sher, I had an episiotomy the first time; didn't feel it as the skin is stretched and numb. But later as it healed and sex was extremely painful my asshole doctor told me I just had to put up with it until it stopped hurting?! Fuck, I just stopped having sex (and I was only 19), but it was hubby the squirrel so I ended up divorcing him.

Perdita

 

[Guest]

Wonderful thread!

I always liked hearing about the insatiable female kitties.

She-kitty rolls on the ground, meowing, writhing, enticing all the tom cats.

The boys are all gathered around her, watching, drooling, waiting until she gets up on all fours and puts her tail to the side (hey baby!). And then a brave soul jumps on, grabs the scruff of her neck in his teeth and then does the dirty deed.

When the tom cat pulls out, tiny barbs on the kitty penis hurt so she yowls and tries to bite, which is one of the reasons he's holding her by the neck. (That stimulation is necessary - it is what causes ovulation.)

Then he jumps away, licking himself (and wouldn't human males like to do that?) and she begins the pattern all over again - rolling around on her back, meowing and enticing. It goes on for hours.

And when I was an undergrad, there was a psych major who exhibited similar behavior!



Sher - They don't do episiotomies as a routine anymore - and thank goodness, because they are largely unnecessary. If it does happen, as 'dita said, you don't feel it. There's too much else happening!

 

[shereads]

Re: Wonderful thread!

When the tom cat pulls out, tiny barbs on the kitty penis hurt so she yowls and tries to bite, which is one of the reasons he's holding her by the neck. (That stimulation is necessary - it is what causes ovulation.)

That explains why it always sounds like a gang rape when the local stray cats "date" on the deck outside my bedroom...But why must it happen at 4 a.m.?
Do they get her drunk first?

I notice that nobody has objected to being reincarnated as an obsessed, co-dependent Idaho Ground Squirrel. That's a little disturbing.

 

[lucky-E-leven]

Re: Re: Wonderful thread!

I notice that nobody has objected to being reincarnated as an obsessed, co-dependent Idaho Ground Squirrel. That's a little disturbing.

Lesser of three evils?

~lucky

 

[shereads]

Re: Re: Re: Wonderful thread!

Weevils? There's been no mention of weevils.

 

[lucky-E-leven]

Re: Re: Re: Re: Wonderful thread!

Weevils? There's been no mention of weevils.

Might wanna wook again and be vewy, vewy cewtain.

~lucky (Wapscawwion of the highest order)

 

[shereads]

What tricks has your dog taught you?

Mine has taught me to move furniture so she can retrieve her tennis ball. It rolls behind the TV stand all by itself - if I'm at the computer, this happens as often as six times a day.

Mysteriously, the ball has never lost itself behind furniture when the dog was here alone. The ball is smart enough to know there's nobody to rescue it.

~~~

Editorial from the NY Times, regarding news reports of a hyper-smart border collie in Germany:

By JAMES GORMAN

Published: June 15, 2004

I have always been a bit defensive about the intelligence of my dogs. I have tried to be objective, but everything in human nature goes against objectivity when it comes to children and pets. Love and loyalty cloud the clear, stark gaze of science, and that, I suspect, is why several German scientists recently conducted experiments with somebody else's border collie.

The dog, Rico, is really smart. No surprise there. Border collies are supposed to be smart. But this dog is off the charts. He is reported to be able to fetch 200 objects by name. Different names, that is. Our family dog, Sophie, a mixed breed, can fetch an unlimited variety of objects by name. They just all have the same name. Socks, toys, sticks, gloves, various items of dirty laundry from a tipped-over hamper - to Sophie, each and every one of them is a ball.

Rico, obviously, is more rigid and less imaginative in his interpretation of language. You can put a whole bunch of different things in another room and tell him to fetch, say, the toy soccer ball. He will scorn the tennis ball and the golf ball and bring back the proper item.

Furthermore, if you put something he has never seen with a group of familiar objects and tell him to go get it, using a name he has never heard, he figures it out. At least, he figures it out as long as he is in his own apartment with his owner giving him the commands. Even so, the researchers claim that his performance shows that a dog has displayed a very sophisticated form of learning, previously thought to be limited to human beings.

Well, la-dee-dah! That's what I say. There's enough border collie worship already in the dog world without the addition of an Albert Einstein. They're supposed to be the smartest breed. They learn quickly. They herd anything. If Timmy told a border collie to go for help, it would ask, What kind? They are so smart and intense you have to be a special sort of person to qualify to own one. Fine. But has it occurred to anyone that the kids who get the best grades in high school are not always the smartest?

It turns out that it has. I called a few people about Rico and dogs in general - some serious scientists and some serious dog handlers. Warren Mick, a border collie trainer in upstate New York who is president of the Northeast Border Collie Association, said the performance of border collies had a lot to do with "motivation." They want to work.

Eve D. Marschark, who trains border collies and teaches at Temple University, said their abilities had a lot to do with sensitivity. Border collies, she said, have a "high sensitivity to sight, sound, motion." She didn't say they aren't smart, but intelligence itself was not the issue.

And Brian Hare, of the Max-Planck Institute of Evolutionary Anthropology in Leipzig, the same institute where the work with Rico was done (by other scientists), said high levels of training were not necessarily indications of intelligence. To equate proficiency in traditional dog-obedience training with intelligence was ludicrous, he said.

And that is what I have been trying to tell family members, neighbors and other interested parties for years. So what if Pippi, the sweetest of several Cairn terriers we have owned, didn't like to heel. Why should she?

The dog of ours that seemed smartest, a Pomeranian named Pumba, was obedient when it suited him. Pumba would do anything, as long as there was food involved. When I thought I was teaching him to come when I called, by giving him a treat, what he learned was that if he ran away from me as often as possible, I would have to call him more often. That would mean more treats.

If I didn't clearly show him a worthwhile treat (he didn't like some biscuits), he would make me chase him. A grown man chasing a Pomeranian in a fit of frustration is not a pretty sight. You can't run and try to grab something a little bit higher than your ankles at the same time.

So you see, my dogs, with their limited proficiency at obeying me, may not have seemed so smart. But what was really going on is that they simply had other agendas.

There is another widespread perception that I'd like to correct. Some doubts have been raised about the ability, if not the sanity, of the person who trained my dogs, trudging back and forth across the yard, hauling a Cairn terrier behind him (me) on a leash, waving a piece of chicken skin at Pumba, promising that I would not shut the door behind him once he took the treat.

Well, what is good for the collie, is good for the shepherd. I'm not dumb or incompetent. It's a question of motivation. I have other things on my mind. If I really wanted to, I could teach a dog, some dog, a huge vocabulary. Really.