Message-ID: <l03130305b6cda9868333@[134.29.11.43]>
>On Thu, 8 Mar 2001, Gerald Henkel-Johnson wrote:
>
>> I have a unique request. A fellow instructor in our department is
>> teaching a human sexuality class. She mentioned she once saw a video
>> which showed an elephant's erect prehensile penis (a quite stunning
>> sight!).
I'll wade in here, albeit with incomplete information. I promise to say only
what I'm pretty sure I know.
Elephant mating, as you can imagine, requires a somewhat different geometry
than many other mammal species. Flexibility of the spine creates a lot of
options, without getting too lurid here, that aren't available to those
whose torsos are configured more like beach balls or watermelons. Nature's
solution to this, evolved as the elephant's body type evolved, is that the
male is equipped with a long (3-5 feet) phallus, at the base of which are
several muscles that allow him to steer it to the female's vaginal opening.
It's not prehensile, but it is guided, and it is definitely impressive to
see it waving around during the mating preliminaries.
In case anybody's interested, elephants also have an interesting mating
system. As near as we can tell, a female in heat will mate with any male,
but the last male to mate will be the father of the calf. The biggest,
meanest male in the neighborhood mates with her, and then guards her to keep
others away. This works only until and unless a bigger, tougher male comes
along. If one does, then A is displaced by B, who tries to keep all others
away, etc. Because the scent of an interested female carries, males come
from quite a distance. The contests last until the female is no longer in
heat.
Sufficiently clinical to avoid offending the tenderhearted, I hope. And
please notice that I passed on the easy opportunity to feed myself several
lovely straight lines...
Best regards,
Michael Renner
