The Courtship of Animals

The author surveys courtship and mating across the animal kingdom, applying Darwinian ideas of sexual selection to mammals, birds, reptiles, amphibians, fishes, insects, arachnids and crustaceans. Chapters examine weapons, ornament, song, dance, scent and anatomy as means of display and competition; variations in mating systems from monogamy to polygamy and lekking; parental roles and reversed sex roles; hermaphroditism, parthenogenesis and other reproductive shortcuts; and the social organization of ants, bees and other social insects. Explanations draw on hormones, secondary sexual characters and evolutionary theory, and occasional comparisons are made to human mating and social implications.