Arthrodires got penises!

i-e88a953e59c2ce6c5e2ac4568c7f0c36-rb.png

This is the skull of an arthrodire, an armored placoderm from the Devonian.

i-8247d73a539b87b7e84565591c26eeb9-dunkleosteus_skull.jpeg

Somehow, 20 foot long predatory fish with a mouth lined with razor-edged bony shears has never made me think of sexy time…until I ran across this comparison image.

i-db49466f9ac730171de69fa53e3c0c46-dunkleosteus.jpeg

Oh, schwiiing. It really doesn't take much to get a mammal to associate just about anything with sex. And then, what do you know, the latest Nature has a short article on an interesting fossil: it's the pelvic region of an arthrodire, Incisoscutum ritchiei, and look what it's got: an ossified clasper, comparable to the erectile organ of modern sharks. This is a bony rod that would have been the core of an intromittent organ in the living animal, so what we have here is a small relic of the sex life of a big fish from a few hundred million years ago.

i-4efd9ebafaaec490d247aa7928efa45c-clasper.jpeg
a, Pelvic girdle in dorsal view; b, pelvic girdle restored.

Think about this, you over-sexed apes: what will be left of your manhood 300 million years from now?


Ahlberg P, Trinajstic K, Johanson Z, Long J (2009) Pelvic claspers confirm chondrichthyan-like internal fertilization in arthrodires. Nature 460:888-889.

More like this

On the fifth day of this year, I found myself sitting in the living room of the legendary Sir David Attenborough, drinking coffee and talking to him about wildlife, filmmaking and his career for the better part of an hour.