The very few things in this world that are as determined as a horny male. Luckily in the modern human society, there are police, laws and jails in place that have forced the male human to be gentle and persuasive as opposed to being forceful brutes, which i am sure our forefathers, from the cave ages were.
However, not all female species are lucky enough to have a civilized law and mechanisms in place to have their males respect ‘No’ to their advances. Often many species in the animal kingdom, especially the ones where the males species are bigger and stronger than the female species, the females often have little to no say to copulation.
That is why female species in the other animal kingdoms have resorted to finding ways to avoid forceful copulations. Some of the tactics used include; running away from an advancing horny male as fast as possible, and hiding from them among other tactics.
Certain female species of dragonflies have in the last one week become a major topic across the internet for their rather peculiar way of avoiding advances from horny males. These females fake death!
This discovery was made by a biologist from the University of Zurich while collecting larvae in the Swiss Alps. The biologist, Rassim Khelifa, one day during his excursion out in the Swiss Alps notices one dragonfly chasing another, then suddenly the one being chased stopped flying and dropped to the ground, legs upwards.
The pursuer, hovered the supposed dead body of the other dragonfly for short period then flew away. Surprised by the sudden death of the dragonfly that was being pursued, Khelifa became interested in the fallen insect. As he approach the it on the ground, he noticed it is a female dragonfly, and all of a sudden, the insect awoke, flipped over, and flew away.
The incident puzzled Khelifa, and he began entertaining this idea, of what if the female was faking death to get away from the horny male pursuing her? So Khelifa set out to learn more about this strange behavior, and begun studying the species of dragonflies in their natural habitat.
He observed 31 male-female pursuits, and over time, he confirmed his suspicion that the females were faking death; it occurred 27 times out of the 31 observations he made. Khelifa also noted that the females who faked death had either left her eggs or was on her way to where she left them.
Khelifa went ahead to compile a report noting that this female species of dragonfly were faking death to avoid mating. He notes that unlike other species of the dragonflies, these males don’t stop attempting to mate even after being successful in previous attempts. The males also do not take part in protecting the eggs. Khelifa also makes an astounding observations, that these males have the ability to pull out sperms from prior males from the female reproductive tract using their penises. Khelifa suspect that this act could be damaging to the females that have already laid eggs.
He further notes that in addition to faking deaths when being pursued by a male, the female species also tend to hide among thick vegetation while searching for food.