rsilver@world.std.com (Richard Silver) (06/02/91)
I read somewhere that the male Walrus has a long bone associated with his reproductive system. Can someone identify this object, tell us which other
rsilver@world.std.com (Richard Silver) (06/03/91)
I read somewhere that the male Walrus has a long bone associated with his reproductive system. Can someone identify this object, tell us which other mammal has such a tool and its function?
kell@cs.albany.edu (Brian A. Kell) (06/03/91)
I'm not a biologist, but... Once, when visiting Los Angeles, I went to the La Brea tar pits, which contain an unusually large number of animal bones dating from a few 10's of thousands of years ago. Mastodons and saber-toothed tigers are some of the more famous finds, but, apparently, the most commonly found bones belong to an animal known as the "dire wolf", a cousin of today's canines. Over the years, they have discovered literally tons of dire wolf bones in the tar. On one wall in the museum a few hundred dire wolf skulls were displayed, arranged in order of increasing cranium size, etc. On another wall were a few hundred femurs, I think. And, on another wall were a few hundred "penis bones". The were, if I remember correctly, about half the length and twice the thickness of a pencil. On a fully reconstructed dire wolf skeleton, the penis bone was displayed in the appropriate location, suspended by a wire -- the bone was not attached to any other part of the skeleton. I am told (unathoritatively) that penis bones are normal in canines. I have no idea about walrus, though. ;-) ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Brian Kell SUNY/Albany Department of Computer Science brian@isadora.albany.edu BK7295@ALBNYVMS.BITNET ----------------------------------------------------------------------
sarima@tdatirv.UUCP (Stanley Friesen) (06/05/91)
In article <KELL.91Jun3112633@tarski.albany.edu> kell@cs.albany.edu (Brian A. Kell) writes: >And, on another wall were a few hundred "penis bones". The were, if I >remember correctly, about half the length and twice the thickness of a >pencil. This sounds about right. The 'penis-bone', or baculum, is certainly a likely candidate for preservation. >On a fully reconstructed dire wolf skeleton, the penis bone was >displayed in the appropriate location, suspended by a wire -- the bone >was not attached to any other part of the skeleton. Again, quite correct, it has only one purpose - the obvious one. >I am told (unathoritatively) that penis bones are normal in canines. >I have no idea about walrus, though. ;-) I believe that your source was correct. Many mammals have a baculum (in the males only, of course). It would not surprise me if all, or most, Carnivora had them. And since the pinnipeds (walruses, seals, sea-lions and such) are considered to be closely related to the Carnivora, they are another group that is likely to have them. Actually, I would almost like to see a list of mammalian groups that do *not* have baculi. The only one I can think of for certain right now is primates (including humans). (Hmmm, perhaps even some primates have them). -- --------------- uunet!tdatirv!sarima (Stanley Friesen)
davidh@uhunix1.uhcc.Hawaii.Edu (David A. Helweg) (06/13/91)
In article <19@tdatirv.UUCP> sarima@tdatirv.UUCP (Stanley Friesen) writes: >In article <KELL.91Jun3112633@tarski.albany.edu> kell@cs.albany.edu (Brian A. Kell) writes: > >Actually, I would almost like to see a list of mammalian groups that do >*not* have baculi. The only one I can think of for certain right now >is primates (including humans). (Hmmm, perhaps even some primates have them). >-- I'm 99.44% sure that orders with fibroelastic penis types (ie, ungulates, cetaceans) do not have baculi. Another question I'd like to append onto yours is whether they bone exists in an enlarged state in female spotted hyenas, as they have such enlarged clitorises (based on the naive assumption that fetal tissue for penis/clitoris would include developmental instructions for making a baculum). dah