Male kangaroos has 3 penises

[MrsMurphyIWish]

They don’t. But I was reading Adam Kay’s “Kay’s Anatomy” with my 8 year old son and we got onto reproduction and female kangaroos have 3 vaginas. My son asked, “so do male kangaroos have 3 penises?”. They don’t. They have one what splits - we researched it.

I’m just wondering what kangaroos would identify as if they have 3 vaginas and 2 penises?

Octopuses have detachable penises
When removed from the male's body, this appendage continues to swim towards the female, attaches to her mantle -the structure behind their head where you can find their organs - and can be stored in her mantle cavity. Unfortunately for the male, he dies shortly afterwards.

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=st8-EY71K84

Deep-sea anglerfish have one of the most bizarre and disturbing mating behaviours in the animal kingdom, known as sexual parasitism, where dwarf males bite into and then permanently fuse bodies with larger females. However as off-putting as this may sound, it is actually a remarkably effective strategy.

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=Z-BbpaNXbxg

@Stormydayagain yes, male octopods basically rip off their penis arm and lob it at their potential mate. Doesn’t sound very romantic or efficient.

And IIRC the male anglerfish are tiny in comparison to the female, and the female can have several parasitic genital attached to her. If fact, doesn’t she somehow get to choose when to use them?

The quote, from the true facts about angler fish, "hey there pretty lady, nice gonads" has not aged well.

Three penises? Does that mean he can't cook,do washing OR look after babies?

What if she just swims away quickly? Does the penis arm just slowly sink to the depths?

Female octupi could potentially wipeout the species by being picky

We are supposed to be talking about animals, not humans!.... Oh angler FISH! Sorry thought you were talking about the fishermen there.

Lots of human males like that too 😂

Some species of octopuses have an “arm” which is actually his penis.

He will detach it and throw it at the female

There is a good book called phallacy about this stuff. It is where I leaned some butterflies have light sensitive cells on their genitals. So you can “see” him coming at you and he can “see” it going in. Weird.

Female brown trout fake orgasms in more than 50% of their pairings....

Fussy fish fake it | New Scientist

Maybe we can have a new rainbow category,
Two Spirit
Three Penis

So absolutely nothing like humans then.....

https://www.newscientist.com/article/2387237-female-stick-insect-clones-itself-despite-having-sex-with-males/

This stick insect has basically given up on the male sex. Even when the female has been inseminated, it seems many are choosing to just clone themselves instead.

Crocs can also do parthenogenisis. I don't blame them, tbh - have you seen a male croc?! No, thank you.

https://www.newscientist.com/article/2377168-crocodiles-can-reproduce-without-males-and-maybe-dinosaurs-could-too/

If some mystery illness wiped out all of mankind tomorrow, It would be good if women, well the younger ones at least would suddenly get the ability to do this!

Reptiles, birds and dinosaurs, apparently.

So, you know. Terfs might manage it.

@ArabeIIaScott omg the slugs

literally changed my name tonight (to do with the pub chain!)
Omg that was gross and mesmerising all at the same time
Thank you I think

You're welcome. Cigarette?

I've got another one, mourning geckos Lepidodactylus lugubris reproduce without males. Male geckos have been found but are often sterile. However, in order to stimulate egg laying, or that's what they claim, the girls have pseudo copulation. Lesbian geckos!

The Komodo dragon at London Zoo was hatched from an egg laid by parthenogenesis. The keepers found eggs laid by their female. The resulting male isn't in any breeding programmes as he might not have the best genes apparently

I will never look at a slug in the same way again....as I squash it....

There was a komodo dragon at Chester zoo that did that too and all her hatched eggs were male. Not hearing anything different I thought it was perhaps coincidence or hatching temp. But now I'm wondering if their unfertilised eggs are just always male, like honey bees.

.

Komodo dragons have the same sex determination mechanism as birds - determined by Z and W chromosomes, not by temperature like turtles.

A male is ZZ, a female is ZW. WW eggs don't hatch.

Normally an egg is formed by a cell splitting its DNA in half - so an egg has half a set of chromosomes, and the sperm provides the other half. An egg with half a set of chromosomes wouldn't develop.

In theory there are 2 possible ways you could get an egg with a full set of chromosomes that would develop without sperm. Either the DNA split doesn't happen before the egg forms; or the egg forms normally but then the chromosomes double up after the egg forms.

In komodo dragons it's the latter - so the egg starts with only 1 sex chromosome which then gets copied. This means the egg can only be ZZ (male) or WW (not viable). So all parthenogenetically produced dragons are male.

@BinturongsSmellOfPopcorn thank you for that very clear explanation. It's a useful way for species to colonise new areas. They just need one founding female who survives long enough to mate with one of her sons.