Courtship

The coming together of two members of the opposite sex is a necessary preliminary to mating. It may be accomplished by two individuals independently of any larger congregation, or it may result from two individuals pairing off within a breeding population that may have assembled even from the ends of the earth. In the one the problem is to find one another; in the other the problem is to find the appropriate place, called the staging area. In both cases timing and some sort of navigation are important. Mass assembly appears to be the more effective, although a local crowd of any kind of animal may be an open invitation to predators, human or otherwise, and may on occasion become disastrous.

The searching out of a solitary individual by another of the opposite sex can be a difficult matter. In the dark depths of the ocean, for instance, where fish and other marine life forms are extremely scarce and scattered, the chance of encounter is rare indeed. The small angler fish (Photocorynus spiniceps) that cruise around at great depths are most unlikely to meet a member of the opposite sex at a time or place when the female happens to be ready to shed her eggs. As a form of insurance to this end, however, any small, young male that happens to meet a large female, apparently at any time, immediately fastens on to her head or sides by his jaws and thereafter lives a totally parasitic existence sustained by the juices of the female body. Sperm thus becomes available at any time the female may produce eggs to be fertilized.

On land this individual procedure of searching out is common among insects and the more predatory mammals. Male crickets and cicadas sound their familiar signals, by night or by day, which attract any females within hearing distance. More remarkable are those insects and other creatures that produce living light, in some cases for no apparent purpose but in others, such as the firefly, for signalling between the sexes in the dark of summer nights. The male individuals, always more dispensable than females, fly freely at considerable risk, flashing their light at regular intervals. The light of the female, perched more safely on some tall grass, winks back as though it were a landing light, and so they come together. Each of the several species of firefly has its own flash code, or rhythm, and any wasteful attempt at interspecies mixing is avoided. On the same principle, female moths send their personal perfume into the night air, and those males that detect the scent fly toward the source, the winner taking all. Mammals also depend mainly on their sense of smell, being generally colour blind, not too attentive to sound, and, apart from the grazing and browsing creatures, mainly active at night. The scented sex appeal of a cat in heat, whether domestic or wild, excites all the males in the neighbourhood and, with or without the sound of voice, male and female come quickly together in the dark. In all of these, courting is mostly uncalled for since only ready-to-mate individuals are involved in this sexual searching in the dark.

Courting is necessary whenever the male is a supplicant. A female may not be ready to mate, and stimulation in the form of dance or song may be required to create the mood; or, as is commonly the case, there is a surplus of available and eager males, and one must be chosen among many. However it may be, courting is most practiced not only when the female is in command of the final outcome but also when the mating procedure presents certain difficulties. A small male spider dances before a larger and ever ravenous female in an effort to induce her sexual interest rather than her hunger. Birds especially, however, depend on courtship as a preliminary to mating. The mating of birds represents copulation in its simplest form, without benefit of significant anatomical devices. Bird wings are a poor substitute for arms in a sexual embrace. Consequently the fullest cooperation between male and female is essential to success. In most birds a long-lasting, often lifetime, bonding becomes established between a male and female, a bonding that is usually reinforced by ritual behaviour at certain intervals, particularly during the onset of each breeding season and on various occasions when the individuals meet after short periods of separation. In some species a new mate may be taken each season or, as in sparrows, a general promiscuity may prevail.

One important aspect of courtship concerns the question of recognition. In gull colonies, for instance, members of the opposite sex look very much alike, and, at least to humans, the various individuals of one sex or the other may appear exactly the same. The advantages, with regard to successful production, incubation, and rearing of eggs and young, of permanent or semipermanent mate selection, however, are as great in gull colonies as elsewhere. The preliminaries to such a mutual selection not only establish a bond, by various posturings, but also establish the many small idiosyncrasies of action that add up to individuality and make one bird distinguishable among many within a colony, at least to its mate.

Many different forms of sex-oriented behaviour have consequently evolved among birds, depending on the character and particular needs of the various species. Penguins apparently not only look alike to human observers but also to themselves. Penguins seemingly have trouble even distinguishing between the sexes. Being unable to dance or sing, though they can make a lot of noise, male penguins can do little more than offer a pebble to a prospective female. If she accepts it as a token contribution to nest making, the match is on. If it is rejected, the suitor may have picked an unready female or even another male. In the case of most birds, however, the male can either sing, particularly the smaller kinds, or can strut and dance, with wings and feathers displayed, and some species, such as the lyre bird, continue to enchant the female by sight and sound together. In general, the need for physical mating has led to courtship and an emotional bonding between mating pairs throughout much of the animal kingdom at the higher level, particularly among birds and mammals. These are primarily utilitarian functions relating to the survival of the species, but in their fullest expression they represent what seem to man to be among the finest attributes of life.