Review – gay giraffes and lesbian racing lizards

The gay donkey penguin couple “Sphen” and “Magic” in the Sydney aquarium, which successfully raised young talent several times, was world famous. The sympathy for Sphen’s death in August 2024 was correspondingly great. But until homosexual penguins could become crowds, a long time had to go. Observations of same -sex sex between penguins, which were made during an antarctic expedition from 1910 to 1913, were still censored in the subsequent publication. A lot is now known about homosexual behavior in the animal kingdom. Behavioral biologists assume that bonobos use sex to settle conflicts in the group. That includes same -sex sexual practices. But “queer behavior” is also observed in other large ape species, as Josh L. Davis calls it. With giraffes, homosexuality is even mainstream, writes Davis. And mainstream means here: In some populations, over 90 percent of the observed sexual interactions were same -sex.

But gays and lesbian animals are just one aspect of sexual diversity that the science author Davis working for the Natural History Museum London describes in his recently published book “Queer”. After reading this book peppered with examples, the heteronormative ideas that some people express in this way appear not only extremely limited, but alien. The flora and fauna is not satisfied with only two, and also unchangeable gender identities.

The common gap sheet brings it to 23,328 genders.

The white throat, an inconspicuous songbird, has developed, for example, a second pair of gender chromosomes and from the combination of gender chromosomes now result in quasi four genders, which in turn can only reproduce in certain combinations. According to Davis’ description, the common gap sheet, a mushroom type, brings it to 23,328 genders. Although one speaks in mushrooms of “pairing types” when it comes to sexual reproduction – something that would be analogous to “male” and “female”, there are no germ cells due to the same large germ cells. In addition, mushrooms can also multiply asexual.

In many reptiles and fishing, the expression of the gender depends on the temperature in which the eggs are incubated. From eggs of sea turtles, which are warm at less than 29 degrees Celsius, warm sand usually slips into males, higher temperatures make the turtles female. The same applies to crocodiles and other lizards. What draws that climate change changes its gender distribution.

As a rule, parrot fish hatch out of the egg as females, but become male in the course of their lives. Fares like the mangrove-Killifian, in which a single copy can produce male and female germ cells and thus fertilize itself. This peculiarity has probably developed from the fact that the Killifies often live in tiny puddles.

Nd.Diewoche – Our weekly newsletter

With our weekly newsletter Organization Look at the most important topics of the week and read them Highlights our Saturday edition on Friday. Get the free subscription here.

And the mangrove-Killifisch is not the only animal species that no sex partner needed at all to reproduce. The New Mexico Rennic is only in female form. It lays eggs that no longer have to be fertilized, one speaks of parthenogenesis. The new-mexico racing crops still have sex with each other. Some sharks, birds, crocodiles, amphibians, snails and crustaceans are also capable of parthenogenesis.

Davis emphasizes that his book is “not an attempt to justify queerness -whether in animals or otherwise -since this does not require any justification”. There are no comparisons between animals, plants and humans. However, if people want to derive behavioral standards for their own species from nature again, then you may throw all of these examples on their heads. “Queer” mainly leaves an admiring amazement at the incredible variety of sexuality and reproduction on this planet.

Josh L. Davis: Queer. Sex and gender in the world of animals and plants. Main 2025, 128 p., 19.90 €.