Piping the Pipefish

Much like humans, female pipefish are the more alluring and attractive of their species. This is in strict opposition to many other mating relationships in the animal kingdom. Why would this be? Maybe it's because there are fewer male pipefish and the females must fight over them. Maybe it's because male pipefish are picky and do not want to have ugly offspring. Even with all these different options for why female pipefish are the ornamented of a pipefish mating pair, one thing remains constant: the idea that females are more vibrant than males is evolutionary. Though conflicting theories of why these females may be more attractive exist, all theories are surrounded by the idea that the females must perform for the males and that the males prefer beautiful females. The females must appear attractive for a male pipefish to mate with them, and that is an element of sexual selection in pipefish. 

Comments

  1. Jenna ThompsonNovember 12, 2021 at 7:46 PM

    Honestly, just here to say I love the title of your post. I do think it is very interesting how this all works out, and it goes to show that sex/gender doesn't actually matter, it's who carries the babies! interesting and I never would have thought of that.

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