Here are a few of the most interesting ways males attract mates in nature!
10 - Water Boatmen All over the world, a tiny little insect known
as the Water Boatman lives in freshwater.
Growing to a rather unimpressive length of around half an inch, they’re really not
much to look at for us.
However, they’re known for one amazing feat, and let’s just say, it’s super weird.
A few years back it was crowned as the world’s loudest creature relative to body size.
And they owe it all to their…...little guy.
That’s right, Water Boatmen use their genitals to do mating calls!
These little guys can use their genitals to sing a song that’s nearly 100 Decibels loud!
As a point of reference, a noise that loud is equivalent to sitting in the front row
of an orchestra.
If they ever start playing Beethoven, THAT would be even more impressive!
According to experts, most of that sound is lost in the water.
But let’s just say if someone is strolling along a riverbank, and some Water Boatmen
are performing, people nearby can hear it.
While scientists still aren’t totally sure how such tiny little creatures can make such
loud noises, they’re curious to find out, as they’re still doing research on these
guys!
9 - Sage Grouse Not only does The Greater Sage Grouse hold
the distinction of being the largest grouse in North America, but the dudes wear the breasts
in the relationship!
The Sage Grouse is found in the Western United States and parts of Southern Canada.
The male birds have white fluffy breasts.
During mating season, their breasts are on full display when they inflate two air sacs.
Aside from looking pretty ridiculous, these birds are renowned for their bizarre, yet
fascinating, mating rituals.
Their rituals even have a name!
It’s known as the Lek Mating System.
Essentially, the birds will gather each spring for a dance off between the males to see who
can attract a mate.
The male birds will strut around while the females watch.
The ladies then select the most attractive male based on their strutting skills, with
the dominant male sometimes mating with up to 80 percent of the female population!
8 - Giraffes You guys know how Giraffes have those super
long necks?
Did you know It comes in handy when trying to seduce a mate?!
With a neck that measures up to 6 feet long, their neck alone is longer than most people
are tall!
Such a prominent feature comes in handy for a giraffe for a variety of reason.
They’ll use their necks for sparring, as males are trying to gain the respect of the
females.
By establishing a higher place in the social hierarchy, a male giraffe will be more likely
to approach a female giraffe.
After the males get a female to agree to their advances, that’s when things get really
weird.
Before a giraffe romp takes place, the female has to uhhh….go in the male’s mouth.
But why though?!
In order to determine if a prospective female is fertile, the male giraffe has to do a little
taste test.
But really though, how would these guys know what to taste for?!
7 - Bowerbirds For most of us guys, anytime we bring a lady
over, we make sure that our place is AT LEAST halfway presentable right?
Well, bowerbirds know this better than perhaps anyone else!
Found in the forests of New Guinea and Australia are some of nature’s most interesting little
animals.
Male Bowerbirds will build some very elaborate nests in order to attract a mate.
The wild part is that each structure is pretty unique, and they’ll often use random objects,
such glass bottles, plastic toys, and anything else they can get their beaks on.
These birds are basically interior decorators or architects who’ll literally use almost
anything to adorn their nests in order to attract some ladies.
Ahhhhhh nature.
What’s even more interesting is the fact that male Bowerbirds have been known to sabotage
their competition’s nests!
These guys will do whatever it takes to win!
6 - Hooded Seals
Hooded Seals make their home in cold regions of The North Atlantic, often on packs of drifting
ice.
Growing nearly nine feet long, Hooded seals are known for their impressive size.
But they also demonstrate some really interesting breeding habits.
The hood on the males is what gives these seals their name.
The males use their hoods in order to make sounds.
The males use their hood to whenever they feel threatened and also when competing for
resources such as food and shelter.
It’s also a sign of aggression that tells other males to back off.
However, in order to attract female partners, the males will also inflate the hood.
This pinkish balloon-like hood signals to the female seals that these guys are single
and ready to mingle!
While the hood basically looks like the seals are blowing bubble gum out of their noses,
this is apparently a huge turn on for the lady seals.
The seals can even bounce the hood around if just showing off their massive nasal balloon
doesn’t quite do the trick!
5 - Frigatebird
Frigatebirds are all over tropical oceans all over the planet.
If you see one, at first glance, you might think “hey, that’s sort of a cool looking
bird.”
With long beaks, dark black feathers, and a wingspan of roughly seven and a half feet,
these birds do look cool.
The most amazing thing these birds can do is probably the fact that they can soar through
the air for WEEKS at a time!
Without stopping!
They’re able to use the wind currents from warm updrafts to keep them up.
Whenever they get hungry, they’re able to quickly swoop down to the surface of the ocean
and snatch fish and squid.
They’ll even rob other seabirds of their prey!
Anyways, we’re talking about interesting ways to attract females, so let’s get to
how these guys do it.
During mating season, the males will display their impressive gular pouches.
They’ll inflate these pouches when they’re trying to seduce a female, usually on a secluded
oceanic island, where thousands of frigatebirds go to reproduce.
As soon as the first egg is laid, their gular pouch will begin to deflate.
Okay, there’s a really inappropriate analogy to made here, but we’ll spare you of the
obvious reference of where we could have gone with that!
4 - Long Tailed Widowbird
It’s the ultimate Catch-22 of the Animal Kingdom.
Their feathers attract mates but also make it easy for predators to find them . It’s
all about tradeoffs for the Long Tailed Widowbird.
The males have long been known for their distinctive long tails.
Because of their interesting situation, these birds have been studied for years, dating
all the way back to Darwin.
In the 1980’s, Malte Andersson was able to prove that female Long Tailed Widowbirds
did, in fact, prefer longer tails.
So how’d he do it?!
In a nutshell, he clipped parts of the long tails off some males and glued them to the
shorter tails of other males!
He found that the longer the tail on the male, the more success they had during mating season.
The finding was significant because it upheld one of Darwin’s more controversial theories:
That some male ornaments aren’t the product of natural selection, but the product of female
choice.
In other words, the long tails of these birds served only to attract a mate!
3 - Peacocks
Peacocks are often regarded as one of the most beautiful birds on the planet.
Their colorful and tall tailfeathers make them one of the most iconic members of the
animal kingdom.
Unsurprisingly, the feathers are a major factor when it comes time for mating.
Peacocks put on impressive displays when they’re trying to woo their ladies.
The ladies will select their partner based on the size and beauty of the male’s tails.
While the dominant male will often breed with many peahens, the females often become aggressive
with each other to get a shot at hooking up with the dominant male.
Does this sound like a Justin Bieber concert yet?
ANYways, this is another good example of natural selection at work.
Since peahens have a known preference for mates with colorful feathers, the peacocks
with the most colorful feathers will produce the most offspring.
2 - Proboscis Monkey Obviously, if anyone takes one look at a Proboscis
Monkey, the first thing they’d notice is the fact that they have biiiiig noses.
It’s just the males that have the extra big noses, and for them, it actually works
in their favor in the monkey society.
Somehow some way, the ladies of this monkey society love guys with big noses.
Also known as “The Long-Nosed Monkey” because c’mon….duh….these primates are
found mainly on the Southeast Asian Island of Borneo, where they coexist with Orangutans...they
just don’t have the bumper stickers to prove it.
Their unusually big noses have long been studied by biologists, who had no evolutionary explanation
for why there noses are the way that they are, except for until recently.
Studies have found that there’s a clear correlation between the size of the male’s
nose and the number of females he has access to!
So yeah, for monkeys, size does matter…...in the nose.
In addition, studies also found that males with larger noses also tended to have larger
body mass among other cylindrical things if you catch our drift!
1 - Pufferfish Crop Circles are the subject of endless fascination.
Remember that Mel Gibson movie about crop circles?
Anyways, did you know that there are also crop circles underwater?
Weird right?
Well, technically, these circles aren’t really crop circles, but rather geometric
circles on the ocean floor.
These geometric circles are basically the product of Pufferfish fishing for a date!
White-spotted Pufferfish will spend up to six weeks perfecting their love nests, only
to use them for a short romp lasting just a few seconds!
You would think that for that much effort just to get a girl fish, the guys would get
together to discuss a new plan of action right?!
First discovered in 1995 by divers in Japan, the circles were a mystery until just a short
while ago.
The tiny puffer fish, who are just roughly five inches long, will flap about and labor
for weeks to create these circles that sometimes measure up to seven feet in diameter!
Once the intense work on the circles is done, female puffer fish then inspect the work and
decide if they like what they see.
If they do, then it’s time for a few seconds of fun and they’re back to doing whatever
it is female pufferfish like to do!
Here’s what’s next!