Thursday, October 18, 2012
Sex Chin Sacks of Back Up Sperm: Weird Squid Sex
Posted by Audrey Ference on Thu, Oct 18, 2012 at 11:08 AM
Back in the squid makeout melee, the biggest squids grab the females from the bottom and deposit their sperm in a different spot, underneath her mantle, near her "egg chamber". That way, when she unsheathes her "string of 200 jellylike eggs", that sperm gets the first crack at it. As she's putting the eggs in a safe place, other, smaller guys dart out and spray their sperm at them, too. Then if she feels like there's not enough sperm floating around, she can release some of her mouth sperm, as well. It is a real sperm party. Just a roiling cloud of sperm and squid.
The eggs are hidden around the seafloor, ready to hatch in a few weeks and eject sperm of their own. Sperm! That is the takeaway. Squid are just covered in sperm, basically all the time. Calamari, yum.
References:
Discover Magazine, Squid Sex
Squid-World.com, Squid Reproduction
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