Everyone has a friend in their group who is extremely horny. All he thinks about in his whole day is sex and for the same reason, everyone trolls him.
While we all troll that friend, most of the times we lack appropriate words to use for his condition. Well, now that search is going to end. We’ve gotta know about a mammal called Antechinus with whom you can easily relate that friend.
Antechinus in simple words is a mammal who loves and craves for sex so much that he ends up dying for it.
As per National Geographic, Antechinus is so hungry for sex that he mates with as many females as he can, in a violent and wild way. He goes on to have sex with his partner for almost 14 hours nonstop and ends up totally exhausted. It is believed that this burst of speed-mating is his lifetime chance to pass his genes to the next generation
Reportedly, Antechinus exhausts himself so much that his body falls apart. His blood courses with testosterone and stress hormones. His fur falls off and he starts bleeds internally. His immune system fails to fight off incoming infections, and he becomes riddled with gangrene.
But why do they indulge in this suicidal sexual intercourse? And why are they only mammals to do so?
Many biologists have researched on the topic and have tried to find answers since last 3 decades.
1. A section of biologists thinks that females don’t survive very well after breeding so males have to mate with as many females as possible.
2. Others answer the question by calling it a feature of the breed that may have got locked with their evolution.
3. There’s a section which also believes that this is the result of their selfless and sacrificing nature. They end up killing themselves while trying to leave more resources for next generation.
However, Diana Fisher from the University of Queensland has another belief. She explains that it’s because of their diet.
As per Fisher, “These animals feed on insects, and some experience an excess of food once a year but very little at other times. This seasonality increases the further you get from the equator. The species with the most seasonal menus also had shorter breeding seasons, and their males were more likely to die after mating.”
She further explains-
As the ancestors of antechinuses spread south through Australia and New Guinea, they face huge fluctuations in the food supply. The females could raise their young ones better if they gave birth just before the peak season, and were fed enough to feed their kids. However, that doesn’t happen.
She also tells that the case would’ve been different if they were placental mammals like shrews or mice, which could have produced several litters during the peak of food. But they were marsupials: their babies are born at an incredible early stage and rely on their mothers’ milk for a long time. A baby shrew feed for days or weeks but a baby antechinus does so for four months. The females could only fit in one litter during the annual peak.
Fisher tells that, “This had a huge impact on the males, which were forced to compete intensely with each other in a matter of weeks. They didn’t fight. Rather than using claws or teeth, they competed with sperm. The more they had, the more females they impregnated, and the more likely they were to displace the sperm of earlier suitors.”
Fisher also finds a clear relationship between suicidal reproduction and testes size. She tells –
“The biggest testes of all, relative to body size, belong to species whose males die en masse, followed by those where a minority survive to mate again, and then by those with several breeding seasons.”
She concludes by saying-
“The males that put the greatest efforts into sperm competition fathered the most young. It didn’t matter if they burned themselves out in the process, if they metabolised their own muscles to fuel their marathon bouts. These animals are short-lived anyway, so putting all their energy into one frenzied, fatal mating season was the best strategy for them. Living fast and dying young was adaptive”
What are your thoughts on it?
