Get to know barnacles, marine animals that rely on their long penises for mating

KOMPAS. com – Barnacles is an animal in the group of crustaceans or crustaceans of the subclass cirripedia.

It includes shell animals and is still related to crab and shrimp.

These animals are only found in seawater and tend to like shallow waters or strong rolling tides.

The way to find food is to filter out plankton and these animals attach themselves to an object.

Barnacles or barnacles (Cirripedia) have a way to get married is quite complicated. This is because the location of the shelled marine animal is squeezed between the rocks of the sea.

This creature is known to use its long penis to mate with the females around it.

However, the researchers said that if the female’s position is judged to be too far away, the male barnacles will spread their sperm to the female or it’s called spermcasting.

These barnacles are the first known crustaceans to use this strategy.

Read also: Squeezed into rocks, barnacles rely on their very long penises for mating

Grow a long penis

According to the study in the journal Proceedings of the Royal Society B, mostly barnacles is hermaphrodites who spend their lives between hard surfaces.

However, they cannot fertilize themselves, which is why these animals need a partner to reproduce.

When mating, barnacles will pseudocopulate or grow a very long penis and release sperm within the shell of another nearby barnacle, resulting in fertilization.

University of Alberta biologist Marjan Barazandeh and his team observed on Friday (1/18/2013) NBC News and his team observed a species of barnacle in the Northeast Pacific called Pollicipes polymerus, it has a larger penis short the length of its legs.

Meanwhile, the length of his penis did not vary during mating season.

Additionally, they also noted that some barnacle species secrete sperm into the water at low tide.

On the other hand, the researchers also conducted research on 599 barnacles off the coast of British Columbia to understand how barnacles have genetic diversity.

As a result, they found that 37 isolated barnacles had been fertilized with foreign sperm. This assumes that barnacles spreading sperm to females that are far away has been proven.

“The Thumbeles polymerus species is somewhat unique, (because) it has a relatively short penis that cannot extend, and it lives in extreme physical environments (such as rocky beaches with waves), so it appears that sperm capture is more likely to occur in this species compared to others,” the study researchers wrote.

Read also: Facts about barnacles from marine animals that rely on very long penises for mating