The “birds and the bees”

Oyster Sex

Oysters spawn or reproduce during the summer (when the water reaches 75°F) by releasing eggs and sperm into the water (external fertilization)

The first oyster to spawn will release pheromones (chemical signals) which stimulate the oysters to spawn. The egg and sperm fuse in the water and become a fertilized egg or zygote and begins cell division.

After about four hours, the zygote has developed tissues and organs

The larva is free floating, moving with the tides and winds. After about two weeks, the larva is ready to settle down and find a permanent home. It falls to the bottom and with its temporary foot, searches out clean, hard surface. When it finds a place, it secretes cement from a gland to glue itself down to the surface. There it will stay for the remainder of its life.

Oyster after 29 days

Oysters are especially fertile; the female laying over 5,000,000 eggs and the male 2,690,000,000 sperm.

Unfortunately for the oyster, most of these will not make it to adulthood. Only about one in a million fertilized eggs will survive to settle and grow.

Some will die due to water conditions (temperature and salinity), predation, inability to find appropriate surface to attach to and other factors.

But the planktonic oyster larvae are an important part of the food chain.

Oysters, like many invertebrates are hermaphroditic. Most specifically they are sequential hermaphrodites. This means they have the ability to be both sexes although not at the same time.

Oysters start off life as male, then most will change to female.

Daphnia

The mode of reproduction for Daphnia is unusual in that there is are alternating asexual (parthenogenic) and sexual stages

Daphnia reproduce asexually when conditions are good and stable. They are able to make lots of offspring this way.

All daphnia produced asexually are female.

Later on in the season, when conditions are not so favorable (due to overcrowding, accumulation of metabolic wastes, less food, and/or temperature begins to decrease) sexual reproduction occurs.

The eggs the female was holding will hatch into males and they will then reproduce sexually.

Snake Sex

Snakes use internal fertilization Males have a hemepenes Females have a cloaca (posterior

opening that serves as the only such opening for the intestinal, urinary, and (usually) genital tracts of certain animal species)

Some snakes develop externally by laying eggs.

Snake eggs are not hard like bird eggs. They are soft like leather.The baby snakes break out by using a special egg tooth. They lose the egg tooth after they are born

Some snakes give live birth like copperheads, boa constrictors, rattlesnakes, and garter snakes

Earthworms

Earthworms are hermaphrodites (both female and male organs within the same individual). They have testes, seminal vesicles and male pores which produce, store and release the sperm, and ovaries and ovipores

The mating pair overlap front ends ventrally and each exchanges sperm with the other

Honey Bees

A typical small hive contains perhaps 20,000 bees and these are divided into three types: Queen, Drone, and Worker

The Queen: Only 1 per hive Lives for 2 years Female Kills sisters and mother Mates with males lay 1500 eggs/day

 = 200K eggs/year

The Drone: Around 200 per hive Live for 21-32 days spring, 90 days

summer, or until mating, 0 winter Male Mate with queen

Worker: 20,000 to 200,000 per hive 20-40 days summer (worked to death)

140 days winter sterile female make comb, tend larvae, tend young drones

tend queen, clean hive, gather nectargather pollen, evaporate nectar, defend hive

Turkey sex

Some turkey information: Wild turkeys are found in all of the states

except Alaska. In the winter, turkeys can fast for up to

two weeks and lose 50% of their body weight before they die.

Turkeys can fly at speeds up to 55 mph. Turkeys can run at speeds up to 12 mph

Turkeys are polygamous. The males will mate with several females.

The male turkey is called a Tom or a Gobbler.

He will spread his tail feathers, lower his wings, strut around and gobble to attract females.

Snood: flap of skin that hangs over the beak.

Wattle: flap of skin under the beak

Caruncle: flaps of skin at throat

Hen: female turkey Poult: baby turkey Jake: juvenille male