The Pros and Cons of Spiky Genitals
Seed-beetle sex seems like a classic conflict between males and females, but new research gives it a twist.
The story of seed-beetle sex has often been told in a very particular way, with the male in the evolutionary driver’s seat, his hapless mate taken along for a grudging ride. A quick glance at the insect’s penis makes it easy to see why: The appendage is tipped with hundreds of sharp, hard spines that give it the appearance of an elaborate mace. This terrifying surfeit of spikes riddles the female’s reproductive tract with punctures and scrapes that can leave, as the biologist Göran Arnqvist puts it, some “quite massive scars.”
Prickly pricks are great for the male, who tends to hen his spines are particularly long. But the female, who usually endures penetrations from multiple mates,.
