SEX ON EARTH

Not everything you wanted to know about sex, but a fair compendium of the varieties of sexual behavior exhibited by all creatures, great and small.

Indignant at the media’s twice-told tales of spider cannibalism, whale penis sizes or zoo pandas’ sex problems, zoologist and nature writer Howard set out to tell it like it is. Sex has been around for eons; fossils provide evidence of its evolutionary importance. Readers may not remember all the details, but some things will stick—e.g., mallards’ “coercive copulation,” which involves the drake’s corkscrew-shaped penis inserted into the female’s counter-corkscrew–shaped vagina, which has side pockets to trap his unwanted sperm. She can widen the path to admit sperm from high-quality drakes, which she rates by the yellowness of their beaks, a sign of a healthy immune system. Then there’s the toilet brush–shaped dragonfly organ, used to expunge a competitor’s sperm, the slime trail that lures a slug to its mate and the mate-guarding of male mites. Reptilian behavior includes precoital iguana masturbation, thought to prep the male so as not to waste time with the female and risk attack by rivals or predators. But masturbation for pleasure is common, writes Howard, as is homosexuality, bisexuality (bonobos), and even necrophilia and child sexual abuse. The author’s survey includes conservators’ work to preserve species, such as a rare spider threatened by habitat loss. While the information is always interesting, the text reads like a set of essays without an organizing principle. There’s also a bit too much gushing and self-consciousness, as, for example, when Howard vents frustration at not catching a species in the act. He also admits to romanticism in a chapter about monogamy and love apparent in some birds and mammals. However, he is adamant that we just don't know enough about humans to declare what is the norm.

Howard demonstrates that there is much to appreciate about the rites and rituals that govern the when, where and how of species perpetuation.