Can animals be gay? | Disver Wildlife

Contents:

• GAY ANIMALS: ALTERNATE LIFTYL THE WILD
• 5 ANIMAL SPECI THAT ARE TOTALLY GAY
• 11 ANIMAL SPECI THAT PROVE BEG GAY IS NATURAL
• CAN ANIMALS BE GAY?
• GAY ANIMALS
• DOG ABANDONED FOR BEG 'GAY' IS ADOPTED BY SAME-SEX UPLE
• A GAY PENGU UPLE ADOPTED AN EGG A BERL ZOO
• CAN ANIMALS BE GAY?

GAY ANIMALS: ALTERNATE LIFTYL THE WILD

More than 200 years later, rearch has moved past some of the taboos those early rearchers faced and shown that homosexualy is much more mon than prevly thought. Rearchers are now gog beyond jt observg though, wh rearchers at Imperial leadg the way unravellg how, and why, homosexualy is found across nature. This suggts that homosexual activy is not a recent human nstct, cultural or even evolutnary terms, but stead occurs along many branch on the tree of life.

Female homosexualy has been well studied Japane maqu, but Clive's rearch would exame how homosexual behavur differs mal and across environments.

5 ANIMAL SPECI THAT ARE TOTALLY GAY

Rerdg homosexual behavur the wild and llectg blood sampl are the first steps for Clive; the next is sequencg DNA to search for nnectns between the behavur and geic markers.

This ia stemmed om a study showg a rrelatn between geic marker Xq28 and male homosexualy, although there were statistil uncertati about some of the fdgs.

Then they n see what this should look like the real blogil and heredary factors of homosexualy are most certaly not tied to a sgle gene. The explanatns are not exclive of one another, and is likely that a batn of factors are important for the evolutn of homosexualy.

11 ANIMAL SPECI THAT PROVE BEG GAY IS NATURAL

Importantly, this will clu exploratn of homosexual partners the hope of unrstandg different mate-choice strategi reproductive and non-reproductive ntexts. Versluys says: "Homosexualy is still somethg that's not always well unrstood among the scientific muny and maybe even more poorly unrstood among the general populatn.

CAN ANIMALS BE GAY?

And spe the acknowledgement of how wispread homosexualy is nature, rearchers have to ntend wh a arth of rearch that should have been built up over s. It is important to note that the same-sex soc-sexual behavr observed the study is distct om homosexual behavr bee s motivatn and purpose are social, said Jean-Baptiste Le, who studi primate behavr at the Universy of Lethbridge Canada and was not volved the new rearch. Over the past 20 years, a burst of rearch — driven part by a new generatn of scientists more acceptg of queerns — has shown signifint amounts of prevly unreported homosexual behavr throughout the animal kgdom, om flour beetl to gorillas.

Thirteenth-century philosopher and prit Thomas Aquas argued that homosexual behavr humans is wrong precisely bee don’t occur between animals. Gee Murray Levick, the explorer who wrote about homosexual behavr Adélie pengus 1911, shield his observatns of pengu “pravy” om sual observers by rerdg them his field not g the Greek alphabet — and they were still cut om the official expedn reports. A proment mammalogist, Valeri Geist, uldn’t help but notice equent homosexual sex at his bighorn sheep field se the 1960s, but Geist avoid publishg those fdgs bee ma him “crge … to nceive of those magnificent beasts as ‘queers.

The fact that a bird populatn wh many bond femal sharg a few mal between them would have higher reproductive output led historian and ornhologist Jared Diamond to dryly wonr whether “further study of homosexually paired female birds may help clarify what, if anythg, mal are good for — an evolutnary sense, of urse. ” In social animals, the logic go, absolute homosexualy would produce no offsprg, but absolute heterosexualy uld also be limg, as might make for an anism that is “poor at formg social allianc. “The bisexual advantage mol, ” Savolaen nclus, “is perhaps the most nservative geic explanatn for the persistence of homosexual behavr.

GAY ANIMALS

Therefore, aversn to homosexual sex would have had to specifilly arise over the history of life, which this team of rearchers fds unlikely, sce the opportuny st of same-sex sex is relatively low. The bonobo ap, for example, palize on the release of the bondg hormone oxytoc durg homosexual sex to strengthen the social allianc between femal.

Vasey and his team methodilly tted the var theori that have been proposed for the persistence of homosexual sex the monkeys: that the femal were exprsg domance; that they were barterg for parental re; that they were rencilg after a fight; or (my personal favore) that they were stagg sexual enunters to exce nearby mal, what I’d ll the “you wish, guys” theory of monkey lbianism. Sodomy laws stayed on the books until 2003, when the Supreme Court led them unnstutnal — aid by an amic brief cg the rearch that had e out the meantime documentg homosexual activy among might have known about the sheer diversy of animal sexualy a long time ago if we, as a culture, had managed to lower our blrs. A first-ever mm display, "Agast Nature?, " which opened last month at the Universy of Oslo's Natural History Mm Norway, prents 51 speci of animals exhibg homosexualy.

"Homosexualy has been observed more than 1, 500 speci, and the phenomenon has been well scribed for 500 of them, " said Petter Bockman, project ordator of the ia, however, is rarely discsed the scientific muny and is often dismissed as unnatural bee don't appear to benef the larger e of speci ntuatn. " was set up partly to mystify the argument that a homosexual way of livg nnot be accepted bee is agast the "laws of nature" n now be rejected scientifilly, said Geir Soli, project lear for the exhibn.

DOG ABANDONED FOR BEG 'GAY' IS ADOPTED BY SAME-SEX UPLE

"To learn more, see LiveScience's Top 10 prentatn, Gay Animals: Alternate Liftyl the Really Wild StoriSpir Cri Out While MatgThe Paful Reali of Hyena SexSalmon of Small Stature Endowed wh Matg AdvantageWell-fed Crickets Seek Sex Incsantly, Die YoungMystery of Empty Chicken Sex SolvedSmart Bats Have Smaller Tticl. However, scientific quiry to such behavrs didn’t happen until relatively recently due to historilly pervasive, negative attus towards homosexualy humans. On the other hand, bee female maqu will reproduce wh mal throughout their lifetime regardls of their tert homosexual behavr, the end the relatnships do not acce any st to lifetime reproductn.

(Image cred: © Chris Johnson – earthOCEAN)Homosexualy has been documented more than 450 speci of vertebrat signalg that sexual preference is blogilly termed animals. Mal also take to homosexual play but tend to leave their partner soon after, makg what we ll the human world a one night stand.

(Image cred: © Chris Johnson – earthOCEAN)Homosexual activy occurs wh about the same equency as heterosexual play amongst the mare mammals. [See more pictur of dolphs]BisonHomosexual mountg between mal tends to be more mon than heterosexual female-male pulatn among Amerin bison, pecially bee femal only mate wh the bulls about once a year.

A GAY PENGU UPLE ADOPTED AN EGG A BERL ZOO

(Image cred: Geoff Shter)Splashg around the water is brought to a pletely new level gray whal, where homosexual teractns are que mon. Zoologists are disverg that homosexual and bisexual activy is not unknown wh the animal and Silo, two male chstrap pengus at New York's Central Park Zoo have been separable for six years now. Filmmakers recently went search of homosexual wild animals as part of a Natnal Geographic Ultimate Explorer documentary about the female's role the matg game.

"The homosexual behavr that go on is pletely bafflg and trigug, " says Natnal Geographic Ultimate Explorer rrponnt, Mireya Mayor. "Well, perhaps, a roundabout way, they are seekg mal, suggts primatologist Amy argu that female maqu may enhance their social posn through homosexual timacy which turn fluenc breedg succs.

Already, s of animal homosexualy have been ced succsful urt s brought agast stat like Texas, where gay sex was, until recently, scientists say we should be wary of referrg to animals when nsirg what's acceptable human society. For stance, fantici, as practiced by lns and many other animals, isn't somethg people, gay or straight, generally approve of HomosexualySo how far n we go g animals to help unrstand human homosexualy?

CAN ANIMALS BE GAY?

"The bottom le is that anythg that happens other primat, and particularly other ap, is likely to have strong evolutnary ntuy wh what happens humans, " he says the bonobo's e of homosexual activy for social bondg is a possible example, addg, "One of the ma arguments for human homosexual behavr is that helps bond male groups together, particularly where a group of dividuals are pennt on each other, as they might be huntg or warfare. However, as Dunbar adms, there's a long way to go before the of homosexualy humans are fully said, "Nobody's really vtigated this issue thoroughly, bee 's so polilly sensive. Regardls of what your sixth gra relign teacher may have said, homosexual activy is natural and the overwhelmg majory of animals are queer.