Hey Weirdos, before we begin today’s show I need to first apologize slash give a disclaimer. No none of that adults only stuff as that should be obvious by the title, and for all of you returning weirdos out there; no, I need do apologize as this episode won’t have as many of the fun weird sound effects as normal. Why? Well because being an adult is hard. Truthfully its because this last week my roommate Emily (and our dogs, Dolly and Ron) have moved from our tiny apartment to a house with a huge backyard. But since we had to rush and pack all our moving in to only one day (Sunday). meant that I only had Monday to add my finishing touches, record and edit today’s episode. So because I already know that this episode isn’t at the quality I want it I figured that I should focus more on the content verse the funny noisy gimmicks. But even if this episode isn’t exactly what I want it to sound like, I do have faith in the content. After all, that’s why you all tune in, for grow your beautiful weird brain! Anyway, please enjoy this special Valentine’s Day episode! Love ya!
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Ah Love! Valentine’s Day! Love is everywhere on this chocolate filled day. It’s a day for you to share it with the one that you love in hopes and dreams of your parents to make sweet, sweet babies via sex…unless of course if your single then I guess you just get to love yourself. Best get the vibrator out ladies.
Welcome to Weird Animal Facts Explicit a show dedicated to the weird, odd, unusually, gross and often times disturbing facts about animals. Since I find myself single yet again on this Valentine’s Day, as I’m sure many of you do as well, there is no need to panic! Nor any reason for you to go get drunk on rose and swipe through the human trash selection that is Tinder just so that you can get fucked tonight. Because your animal care professional friend, Deidre here, is here to tell you that you don’t need a man! And I know how it is. The pressure! I’m in my thirties and haven’t had anything close to a prospect of a husband so to give me his sperm so that I can give my parents grandchildren. I understand the pressures not only family but society puts on us single folks. I’m just lucky my sister just popped out her second baby so to keep the attention off my single life for another few months at least.
But if you are like many of us in this world; single, at it along, hand over fist, re-watching episode 2 of Pam and Tommy just so you can see ass and dick you don’t have to worry or feel bad about going alone. As there are many animals in the world who don’t need a man to make their begging for grandchildren parents happy. That’s right! Just because this is the Valentine’s Day episode does not mean we have to talk about the love between a man and a woman. Oh no, we’re talking about the love you give yourself. Self-love! And the ultimate biological term for self-love is asexual reproduction!
Don’t get carried away or worried as we human women have yet to produce offspring without the sperm of a man. So recharge your magic wand, pop open the top of your lube and keep at it.
Fun Fact: According to Christian theology, Mary, was a Jewish woman, who was married, yet hadn’t had sex with her husband, Joseph, nor anyone else, yet somehow, she popped out the savior of the world Jesus Christ. She had to have fucked somebody. The Holy Spirit?
Mary: Who are you?
Holy: the name’s Spirit. Holy Spirit. My boss sent me down here to fuck you.
Mary: What?
Holy: Relax honey, just like Pam’s sex tape, this is gonna make you famous.
Asexual Reproduction! What is it? And is it as pleasurable as me alone in my room? Probably not. As penetration isn’t happening. But what is happening is babies…somehow.
Asexual reproduction: reproduction without union of individuals or gametes.
Let’s back up for a second, because even though this is a podcast for adult, from my sexual experience there are some people out there who don’t know what sex is. In the grand scheme of life, and according to the great Charles Darwin the only reason to live is to fuck…so to create offspring so that those offspring can carry on your genes for eternity. That’s how you live forever!! The normal way of reproduction is sexual reproduction; this is what you see in porn. A man and woman unite and the man deposits is gametes; aka sperm, into the woman whose body then does the whole create life thing and viola! A beautiful baby mixed copy of both mommy and daddy. That’s the purpose of sex. I mean the purpose of sex should be to make you feel good but let’s just take the subjectiveness out of it and simply look at sex and reproduction as a function.
Hey ladies and lads, does your partner want to have sex but you’re just not up to it at the moment? Well, I’m here to tell you that there’s a simple and easy solution to get your partner on the same page as you and out the mood. Here are some examples: “I don’t see the fusion of our haploids in our future this evening.” “I’m sorry honey, but this organism isn’t feeling optimal in the process of combining her genetic information of a single set of chromosomes via gamete with the opposing organism before her during tonight’s evening endeavors.” Through our studies and experiments we have found that the heavy use of scientific terms in the bedroom is a great way to turn a partner off. Give it a try the next time you simply want to go to sleep.
In the world of asexual reproduction typically it is reserved for unicellular organisms (There goes my hard on) or plants (and now its back. Nothing does it for me quite like a Christmas tree). Unicellular organism are things like bacteria for example. But there are some multicellular animals that can create life without a mate. Animals like jellyfish, sponges, hydra, worms, insects, lizards and yes, even sharks can all create live without a sperm. But how? To understand how this works we have to break it down.
In the animal world there are four types of asexual reproduction: fission, budding, fragmentation and parthenogenesis. And we’re gonna talk about each! Time to learn!
Fission: like the great red sea, I shall split thee! Okay, okay, for all you real sciency nerds out there I know what you’re thinking: eukaryotes don’t do fission; that’s reserved for bacteria and archaea.
Quick fast fact for you not so sciency nerds: Eukaryotes, bacteria and archaea are the three groups of organisms of the Domain. You know that song? (Kingdom, Phylum, class, order, family, genus, species). Before the song even starts, above kingdom is the domain. That’s where we’re at. Eukaryotes, like us humans, have a nucleus. Bacteria and archaea don’t. You should be familiar with bacteria so I won’t get into that, but archaea are very similar to bacteria. Most live in extreme environments like the hot springs of Yellowstone National Park. But some also live in your gut alongside bacteria so there’s a bit of difference between them that we won’t get into.
But the reason why those real sciency nerds may have a problem with me including fission in the episode is because eukaryotes don’t do this. We do mitosis. What is happening? Its been over a decade since I was in school. And you expect me to remember all this shit? No I don’t. But maybe you might be familiar with these words. Mitosis is the splitting of a parent cell into two daughter cells. Basically, making a copy of itself. Bactria and archaea make copies of themselves too, we just call is fission. So mitosis is like how identical twins are made? Yeah. Exactly. However, those eggs are already fertilized so… no quite asexual reproduction but it’s the same concept. Then why the fuck are you talking about fission it animals don’t do it! Because if you look up asexual reproduction in animals this will definitely pop up in your search and I don’t want you to get confused and think animals do this because they don’t. The internet can be wrong at times. Then why does it pop up when I google it! Because of search engine optimization. However through, it is said that some coral reproduce via fission! So there. That’s an animal! Yeah but barely. Hey, we’re playing horseshoes and hand grenades, just like a drunken night on Tinder, we’ve got low standards, but still they’re standards!
Budding: Now we’re getting into animals! Like real, real animals. I would describe budding, and since I’m describing it, you know its going to be good, like a skin tag. Only instead of just chilling on your body, being somewhat annoying it continues to grow and as it grows its actually growing as your clone. Then once satisfied with its size it popped off as your body double! You’re making that up. I wish I was.
For all you Marvel fans out there, you guys remember Hydra right? The evil bad guys who infiltrated Shield and took over! Well Hydra got its name from the actual hydra animal (or so I assume). What’s a hydra you ask? Well, is not an octopus like their logo suggests. But good job on the marketing team as a giant menacing looking octopus looks way more evil and threatening over a no faced, mutated human sperm looking thing, with wiggly tentacles resembling more of an unfinished drunk jellyfish of fresh water that can only be seen under a microscope. Yeah, the Hydra logo is much scarier.
However, the actual hydra is a perfect metaphor for the Hydra hidden agenda. It starts with one man (or one hydra) with an idea (or a budding piece). His idea of taking down shield is shared with others (AKA the hydra animal budding a clone off from its body). Now there are two of them. But with both recruit, two more, and then those two recruits more, and so on so forth. That’s what Hydra did before taking down Shield! But you don’t need to be worried about the actual hydra animal as they are no threat to you. Or Shield.
Fun Fact: Budding isn’t the only way hydra reproduce. Some are hermaphrodites, while others had separate sexes. And instead of having a penis go inside a vagina, one, the male, will get swells around its shaft (gastric region), that are filled with sperm (looking similar to the budding). While the other, female, will also develop swells that are similar but her swells are filled with an egg. When the male lets loose his seed and they bond with the egg on the female, that’s fertilization and the egg separate and an embryo is created!
Other animals known for asexual reproduction via budding are jellyfish, coral and sea anemone. For jellyfish, we actually briefly talked about who they do this in the immortal jellyfish episode 15. In case you forgot here’s a flashback:
(Flashback music)
Now for the life cycle. After boinking or... whatever you want to call it, since boinking isn’t really appropriate... an egg is created and then becomes a planula larva which will find its way to the sea floor and then kind of becomes a Charlie Brown looking Christmas tree which is called a polyp.
Next, and try to stay with me as it starts to get really weird: imagine a can of pringles; like I said weird. They are stacked up. While the jellyfish is in that Charlie Brown Christmas tree stage (AKA polyp) it begins to do what is considered cloning and creates what I am calling pringles stacks, with the stalk of the Christmas tree working like a skewer holding them all in place. As each pringles is pulled out (AKA leaves the “nest”) a new animal is now out there in the world called ephyra. And from the ephyra it soon will transform into that of a medusa! And a medusa is what we common folks refer to as a jellyfish: with tentacles and all.
(Flashback music)
The budding of jellyfish can take place in the developmental stage of their life. After all they aren’t just born in that Hollywood version of themselves. It takes some time to get there. Its during that polyp stage and a polyp looks very similar to the hydra from earlier. But where the hydra looks to be getting ingrown hairs all over its shaft, the jellyfish creates a copy on top, as if adding another Pringle chip. Then once that chip is ready to grow up, off it goes to turn into that final medusa form.
Fragmentation: Is pretty much what it sounds like.
Fragmentation: the act or process of detaching or breaking into small separate parts.
Think of a sea star. Because its not a damn Star Fish! Do NOT call it that. It’s a sea star because its not a fish. And because I already explained this in episode 41 I will not be doing it again here. But it’s a sea star. As mentioned in the sea star episode 41, we talked about how if a sea star loses one of their many beautiful arms, they can grow it back. Which is wildly amazing and weird all on its own, but what about that abandoned arm? Well if that arm is big enough, or even if the sea star is cut in half, as that would be big enough, that severed piece can create a brand now sea star!
Do you think if you cut off Aquaman’s leg, his leg could grow another Aquaman? But the Jason Momoa Aquamen, not the original. Unless you prefer a chiseled short haired blonde white man in a bright ass orange figure skating wardrobe. To each their own.
Parthenogenesis: Hey there women at home. Have you even thought about becoming a mother, are the pressures of your family bearing down on you to have a child and you just can’t take it anymore, so you then go to open up that dating ap but whenever you do, you find that there are not plenty of fish in the sea. Don’t you wish you could still have a child but don’t want to deal with the never-ending array of blobfish? Don’t you wish you could just have a baby all you own? Well now you can! With Parthenogenesis! No need to sit through another boring date listening to Mr. Wrong man-splain to you how to pronounce your own name or wonder if he only bought you that lobster dinner in hopes to see how many treasures your cavern holds. The wait to be a mother is over and its true! You no longer need a man! Give us a call today to learn more the benefits of parthenogenesis. (No available for all species).
That’s right, becoming a mother has never been easier! All it takes, is getting rid of the males. Or at least that’s what the scientist think. In multiple occasions, aquariums around the world have housed only female sharks and somehow they had babies! Now you may be thinking two things: what if one was really a male and the care takers just can’t tell the difference. Well, no, they can tell, because its not just looking…well for sharks you can just look, but there also DNA testing. If they’re doing a DNA test then they can find out who the dad is and if that shark was just storing sperm like many other animals do. You’re right, and there has been some finding of sharks storing sperm but it’s in the DNA testing that will tell us all.
Murray: Welcome back to this very special edition of Murray. We have Mama shark here who has a one year old; baby shark. Who’s sitting backstage with grandma shark. And for those of you just joining us here on stage with me we have Mama Shark, who is convinced that Daddy shark is indeed the father.
Daddy: I can’t be the daddy.
Murray: Settle down Daddy. Mama was Daddy surprised when you told him you were pregnant?
Mama: Well he should have been.
Daddy: Of course I was shocked! I ain’t swam in the same pool as her since Monterey Bay. That was only five years ago. How can I be the Daddy!
Mama: Well I ain’t been with no other shark but girls. And as we all know that don’t work…no matter how hard we tried.
Daddy: You just want pup support from me. That’s what the animal care takers are for. And all your lesbian lover sharks.
(crowd reacts)
Mama: That ain’t true. I want the truth! (crowd yelling)
Murray: We can settle this all right now. As I’m being handed, right now. The results. (cheer) In the case of one year Baby shark. Daddy shark. You are not the father.
Daddy: Ya! What I tell you? What I tell you? I mean look at the baby. Look at the baby.
This shit happens! Maybe without the riled up audience, but this seemingly virgin birth has happened in multiple animals that aren’t invertebrates. In addition to sharks, other animals that have reproduced asexually via parthenogenesis are invertebrates like stick bugs and bees. But for those vertebrates, animals with backbones, LIZARDS!! And since lizard people as said to exist all the single female celebrates could have a baby without a man! That is if lizard people are real…But until that gets revied by Murray my bet is no.
In the southern United States, specifically New Mexico and Arizona, there is species of lizard that lives as freely as the Amazonian Warriors Wonder Woman originated from. Because they are all females. These are called New Mexican Whip tailed lizards. And the findings of these lizards being all female is fairly recent. Because unlike sharks, where you can look to see, aw yes, that is a man. You can’t really do that with lizards as their sex organs don’t dangle around freely for all to see.
Right now, if you’re drifting off and aren’t using you brain in an attempt to problem solve then you are simply accepting this fact. And for that thank you for having such blind faith in my words. But for those of you sitting there yelling at your phone: “That doesn’t make any fucking sense!” How can a species survive with only females? Don’t everyone want sperm? Want? No. Need? Not necessarily.
In the cases of the sharks that live in aquariums you could say that their situation was similar to the original Jurassic Park. “Life finds a way.” And you could argue that these all-female lizard colonies found their own way. A way free of men! “This is the way!”
But how exactly does this work? How do animals like sharks, stick bugs, bees and yes even Komodo dragons have babies without the eggs being fertilized. Simple. Mitosis!
I want you to think back. To college, or maybe high school, especially if you don’t have a fancy BS degree like me. Hopefully in that high school biology class you learned about a term called mitosis. What is this? Its cell division. You take a cell, break it in two and then each one of these new cells both have the same number and types of chromosomes as the original did. Our cells preform mitosis regularly. Like when you cut your body shaving. The cells of your body split so that they create more identical cells so to patch the bleed cut. Pathogenesis is just that…only with eggs.
For the single female, or even lesbian couples wishing to have a baby without the involvement of a dick or sperm; this sounds like a dream. Unfortunately, humans can’t do this. And as amazing as this may sounds, there are some downsides to this mama-baby copy machine. Diversity! Specifically genetic diversity. Think about the cheetah (who can cannot reproduce asexually. They still need a man.). But this isn’t about the how they reproduce. I bring up the cheetah because they population is dwindling. And what was a large part of the reason why was because their weren’t very many individuals to chose from. We humans are lucky, we’ve got all the dicks we could ever want or choose. Big ones, smart ones, curvy ones, pink ones, brown ones. You know it, there’s probably a dick out there for you and with that dick comes a different set of genes. If a population isn’t able to have a wide variety of genes then mutations can develop. And I’m not saying that the case for this female only population of whiptail lizards, or even the other female only species out there. But without having genetic diversity then that population is at risk of being wiped out from diseases or any other change to the environment.
Its like only eating the wheat Chex cereal pieces from your Chex-Mix; sure it will clench your appetite but what if you keep dropping the bag to find out, once you open it, all your favor wheat Chex pieces are destroyed. Now you can’t eat anything and you’ll die! Disclaimer: if this happens to you just go eat something else. This is an example, not real life. End of Disclaimer.
If there is this great risk to dying due to not having genetic diversity; because let’s face it, its not just pathogenesis individuals who can be at risk of this but all the others we’ve listed today too; why preform asexual reproduction at all? Because its fast. And you still carry on your genes. Plus, like the sharks’ cases, if there’s male around, sometimes you’ve just got to get shit done on your own. Women all over the world are known for getting shit done, and is typically better at it then men.
Scientific Names are Hard:
Hydra: Hydra vulgaris
Zebra Shark: Stegostoma fasciatum
New Mexican Whiptail Lizard: Cnemidophorus neomexicanus
So for all you single ladies out there this Valentine’s Day, even if you don’t have a special someone in your life; take some time for yourself; lock your room, put on some sexy music, dim the lights, light some candles and dust off your ol’ reliable masturbation tool of choice and go at it as if you were going to repopulate the Earth in the ways of the animals. Asexual style.