Yes, it's true
Nov. 23rd, 2003 07:11 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
windandwaterReal Life Tentacle Sex
*snuggles![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
askerian for pimping*
Erect Octopus:
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Researchers say they have found erectile tissue in the tentacle of a male octopus, the first time such tissue has been seen in an invertebrate.
Erections are key to sexual reproduction in the males of many, but not all, vertebrate species but it was not known how broadly this particular adaptation was used.
Joseph Thompson, assistant professor of biology at Saint Joseph's University in Philadelphia and Janet Voight of the Field Museum of Natural History in Chicago published their discovery in the Journal of Zoology.
In most octopus males, the tip of one of their eight arms is used to pass spermatophores, little packages filled with sperm, to females during mating. Thompson and Voight found the extra modification in one species of shallow-water octopus.
Thompson, who called the finding weird, said biologists have looked for erectile tissue in other molluscs but not found them.
It is not surprising that no one has noticed this before, Thompson said.
Octopuses, known for their intelligence and complex behaviour, are shy animals. Observing their mating is difficult and often the females attack and eat the males during courtship.
In fact, it was while watching a female turn on a male who was attempting to mate with her that Voight made the discovery. The male hurriedly withdrew his tentacle -- "because the female was probably eyeing him up as lunch," Thompson said.
"She noticed the tip of the arm was swollen. It was distended," he said in a telephone interview.
Thompson had noticed that, under a microscope, the tissue at the end of the copulatory tentacle looked like mammalian erectile tissue. They put two and two together.
"We haven't gotten a male octopus to perform for us, as it were, in the lab," Thompson admitted. "Maybe we should try Viagra."
Why would an octopus need to have an erection? Perhaps for some of the same reasons that other animals have them.
"Erectile tissue might be a way to have a large copulatory organ when it is in use," Thompson said. When not in use, it would be small and out of the way. "Running around with an erection potentially could be difficult."
- Or you can order one of the penis enlargment pills we recieve advertisements for in our e-mail.
*snuggles
askerian for pimping*Erect Octopus:
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Researchers say they have found erectile tissue in the tentacle of a male octopus, the first time such tissue has been seen in an invertebrate.
Erections are key to sexual reproduction in the males of many, but not all, vertebrate species but it was not known how broadly this particular adaptation was used.
Joseph Thompson, assistant professor of biology at Saint Joseph's University in Philadelphia and Janet Voight of the Field Museum of Natural History in Chicago published their discovery in the Journal of Zoology.
In most octopus males, the tip of one of their eight arms is used to pass spermatophores, little packages filled with sperm, to females during mating. Thompson and Voight found the extra modification in one species of shallow-water octopus.
Thompson, who called the finding weird, said biologists have looked for erectile tissue in other molluscs but not found them.
It is not surprising that no one has noticed this before, Thompson said.
Octopuses, known for their intelligence and complex behaviour, are shy animals. Observing their mating is difficult and often the females attack and eat the males during courtship.
In fact, it was while watching a female turn on a male who was attempting to mate with her that Voight made the discovery. The male hurriedly withdrew his tentacle -- "because the female was probably eyeing him up as lunch," Thompson said.
"She noticed the tip of the arm was swollen. It was distended," he said in a telephone interview.
Thompson had noticed that, under a microscope, the tissue at the end of the copulatory tentacle looked like mammalian erectile tissue. They put two and two together.
"We haven't gotten a male octopus to perform for us, as it were, in the lab," Thompson admitted. "Maybe we should try Viagra."
Why would an octopus need to have an erection? Perhaps for some of the same reasons that other animals have them.
"Erectile tissue might be a way to have a large copulatory organ when it is in use," Thompson said. When not in use, it would be small and out of the way. "Running around with an erection potentially could be difficult."
- Or you can order one of the penis enlargment pills we recieve advertisements for in our e-mail.
![[identity profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/openid.png){kind=small}
(no subject)
Date: 2003-11-23 09:47 pm (UTC)Maybe Wufei and all water dragons can benefit from that interesting tidbit.
(no subject)
Date: 2003-11-24 02:10 am (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2003-11-23 11:05 pm (UTC)-_-
*waves tentacles around*
(no subject)
Date: 2003-11-24 12:57 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2003-11-24 12:21 am (UTC)<3's.
(no subject)
Date: 2003-11-24 12:58 pm (UTC)I don't know whether to be disturbed or not because you got turned on by the mating habits of octopii.
I don't know whether to be disturbed or not because you got turned on by the mating habits of octopii.
<_<
>_>
*tentacles you*
(no subject)
Date: 2003-11-24 02:40 pm (UTC)O_O
Heheheh. After that article, I just know someone is probably gonna do an Octopus/Gundam boy fic. X_X
(no subject)
Date: 2003-11-25 12:08 am (UTC)I don't even want to imagine THAT.