Male pregnant seahorses give birth to around a thousand babies. Seahorses come from the family Syngnathidae, which also includes seadragons and pipefish. They're the only animals in which the males get pregnant. After females transfer eggs, the males then fertilise them. But why do male seahorses give birth? And how did this way of reproduction evolve?
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References:
Whittington CM & Friesen CR. The evolution and physiology of male pregnancy in syngnathid fishes. Biol Rev Camb Philos Soc 2020;95:1252-1272.
Roth O, et al. Evolution of male pregnancy associated with remodeling of canonical vertebrate immunity in seahorses and pipefishes. Proc Natl Acad Sci U S A 2020;117:9431-9439.
Wilson AB, et al. Male pregnancy in seahorses and pipefishes (family Syngnathidae): rapid diversification of paternal brood pouch morphology inferred from a molecular phylogeny. J Hered 2001;92:159-166.
#wildlife #nature #seahorse
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What are your sources?
I have a thriving population of Fathead Minnows in my garden pond. Every summer, when the water gets warm enough for eggs to incubate, the male Fathead Minnow finds and spruces up a little cave around the water's edge. He then entices a female to come lay eggs in his cave. If she likes him, they dance around just outside the cave, and then she goes in and lays eggs inside. He fertilizes the eggs and protects them with his life. He is not pregnant. It does not matter where the cave is located, it does not mean he is pregnant. Just because the "cave" is inside the seahorse, that doesn't make him pregnant. Claiming a male seahorse is pregnant because of how he protects his spawn is like saying a female kangaroo is pregnant every time the joey climbs back into the pouch.
The seahorse looked like he were sneezing his kids out 😂 cute
Indeed 😂😂
If only it was that easy for human women to push babies out😂
😂😂😂😂😂
"... some eggs can be lost... " I know almost nothing about seahorses (prior to watching this video), but that looked like a lot of eggs lol Also, quality is incredible as always
I was trying to figure out all of those fit inside her
It looked like all of em tbh lol
I was seriously getting a bit pissed off. She needs to learn how to aim better lol
@@theopulentone1650😂😂😂😂😂😂
letting a comment for yt for one of the most underrated science channels, amazing quality content!
These types of comments keep me going! Thanks man
5:05 best pic of a seahorse ever
You literally deserve more subscribers! Your videos are pure excellence.
Thanks man! Hopefully I’ll get some more with time!
And you absolutely need to learn what the word "literally" means.
What an excellent well researched video, thank you
Glad you enjoyed it!
Some fish, like the Platy fish we have in our home aquarium, give birth to live young. This is the female giving birth to live young. Live bearers like Platys have a reproductive advantage in a relatively crowded environment with other species (like a fish tank with other species of fish in it). The fry pop out of the mother and can swim to safety. However, one gender is expending the energy. The female has to expend energy avoiding the males who want to mate all of the time. The solution in the home aquarium is to up the number of females for every male so that he is chasing around a lot of girls rather than just one. Wild female platys and other similar live bearer females in natural environments don't get such relief. So, female Platys have to expend energy: 1) avoiding males, 2) producing eggs, and 3) retaining those eggs in their bodies until the fry hatch. The females "blow up" when they are pregnant. They are less streamline, making it cost more energy for them to swim. Energy-wise, all the males have to do is find the females and mate with them. Instead of him searching the gravel or hiding spots for eggs to fertilize like with other fish species, he knows where the eggs he wants are. Hence, he chases the females relentlessly, putting more pressure on the females. He has excess energy. She is struggling to swim well enough so that she can find enough food in her expanding pregnant body. Any energy intensive task she can give to him instead (like egg guarding or even male pregnancy) is going to mean more energy overall goes into producing offspring. With shared responsibilities, you are harnessing both male and female energy instead of only female energy. So, Mrs. Seahorse gets to go eat and fill her body with eggs again before her previous brood in even born. As a result, there are more Seahorses in the world.
Thank you. I love learning new things.
I was watching a few of your videos and they were absolutly amazing and then i saw that you only have 5700 Subs how is that even possible?!?!?! Your Videos are so professional keep it up!
Tripled since you said this
You answer all the niche biology questions I have! Best channel, new favorite
I don't know why I'm watching this, but I love it. Thanks for the information I just learned somethings.
Hello! Very glad to have found this top quality channel but you should change your voice audio processing. For example the s-sounds are very sharp so maybe eq that out a little bit
Love your documentation!
What a brilliant video this was very interesting well done 😍😍😍😍
I've always been fascinated by seahorses, pipefish, and seadragons. A little trivia for you: in Baltimore, in the 50s and 60s (and maybe longer) seahorses were a secret symbol for lesbians (because it's the males that give birth). There's something you won't see in a John Waters movie.
Seriously, this video is so professional. Because your subscriber count is so low (I have no idea how!) I thought maybe you stole a video from National Geographic or something! I promise I really mean that. Not just trying to stroke your ego!
Sometime during the last year, this channel lost the ability to respond to comments. Too busy making these darn near perfect videos i guess 😂 like literally i have no ideas for any new improvements. Maybe other than responding to questions 🙂
Humans: my wife is giving birth!! Seahorses: My husbands giving birth!!!
Absolutely amazing; fascinating!!
Amazing videos bro
genuinely made me sad when those eggs fell
Great video
This is amazing! Aren't they precious? Awe!
Great video! Awesome chanal
got recommended this after watching the suicidal salmons video. You deserve to get blessed by the algo
Exactly, same happened to me
Fascinating!
new video aww yea thank you :)
Yes! New video out every 2 weeks so stay tuned for the next one!
This was so beutifull
And that’s why seahorses have been so successful at their own pace and they are now being
Very informative, good job Bro
Thanks man!
From its appearance more like a reptile to unparalleled reproductive behavior, seahorse is missing nothing for wonder & awe. Very illustrative as usual featuring the latest update in. Grades of paternal care are shown leading up to the most complex one. Yet, evolutionary transition does not look as smooth or straightforward as presented here. Some steps more should be taken to the complex level of male reproductive system. That's the impression from this superb footage. Thank you very much! Next!
No wonder I love all sorts of nature❤. Air, earth, sea!
Wow
Male sticklebacks, relatives of the sygnathids, do guard the eggs.
"pregnant" is a gender-specific term according Oxford or Cambridge dictionary whose definition goes "women or female animals having .." What male seahorse is doing is beyond description! (No offense intended.)
Ok this needs more views. Not on social media atm so guess I'm texting and emailing peeps
So if im getting this correct theyre mammals but they are not mammals?
They dont have a 3 bone ear, neither produce milk a long side many other adaptations that make crown mammals… well mammals, this is just another example of convergent evolution
Technically, no, since pregnant mammals have a placenta to provide the unborn offspring with nutrients which doesn't happen with seahorses. Even though seahorses carry and birth live young, they don't qualify as mammals.
It’s El Mago’s fault that the seahorse’s level of parenting has been altered!
seahorse mpreg
7:26 fish bussy
Don't viviparous plants (yes they exist) also have male pregnancy being (presumably) hermaphrodites?
They don't have 2 genders
@@joroc They are both male and female. Parthenogenesis in plants does not happen in plants through gametes AFAIK, so parthenogenesis only plants don't have a biologically defined gender.
@@joroc way to have an opinion on something you know nothing about
Comments for the Algorithm God
Thank you! Really appreciate the support 🙏🏽
Contractions? More like bustin a……..😂
I think somebody is just giving the wrong names to the sea horses just for the sake to say that male can be pregnant too. What makes a female sea horse female? Is not the ability to carry new life? Also, the “female” sea horse is dropping eggs, where are those eggs fertilized?
Male = Smaller, but More Gametes (Sperm/Semen) Female = Bigger, but Fewer Gametes (Ovum/Eggs)
Megnancy. Meriods. Muterus. Menopause.
It's amazing to me how 🤔 living things evolve overtime like God gave every living thing upgrades overtime it's awesome how else could u explain it 🤷🏿♂️
Hmmm if they give birth are they still male?
Yes they're males that give birth simple as that.
I knew the lgbt was gonna find this
This confirms they don't give birth to them they hold them in their pouches/pockets until they hatch. Giving birth and holding them in a pocket are two different things.
They have contractions and give birth that’s painful and real
well conciption happens inside them so it counts as pregnancy
Male provide the nutrition needed by the eggs to develop and had contractions to push them out. Get you feminist apologetic as** outa here
@@dignaallen3244 it's not really painful for almost every other animal.
The eggs are inserted into the male where they are then fertilized, and are hatched INSIDE the male, until he gives birth to them. How is that not giving birth?
all these signs and man is still arrogant that all of this is by randomness not design 😐
How do you know that God didn’t design them to be like that? How can randomness result in species that know they need to breed in order to populate the world and transfer their genes?
For humans this would be so painful 🤦♂️
Male pregnancy - see Suriname toads!
So hold up? She cant carry them because shes female? Ummm...
I wouldn't if given the option, let males do it.
Its because female seahorses have the dicks instead.
You could say it's a little fishy.
@@user-nd7rg5er5g Get out
Yeah it's pretty simple she can't fertilize them so the male does it.
talk about switching gender roles smh
'May have evolved from...' 'May have/possibly caused the......to evolve.......' And there you have it: Evolution-all based on conjecture but treated as fact.
They actually didn't thy have a hallow almost like a kangaroo pouch that acts as incubator* But the mom ultimately is the one who has the eggs and babies to begin with* I like sea horses* I wanted to study them at one point in life* But not any more* Anyways thanks for the video* May 19, 2022 11:24am I know what I know because I know what I know also I'm still me*/
Wow. Male seahorse are so WOKE.
Not as woke as Parthenogenesis or Mysandrists...
Now I understand the majoras mask sidequest
Seahorses are so beautiful when they do their courtship dance and change colors. 🥹🥹🥹🥹🥹🥹🥹🥹🥹🥹🥹🥹🥹🥹🥹🥹
The classification of seahorse sexes must be wrong.🤔🫤
Nope male seahorses do indeed give birth. And they're species of fish that females turn into males or males turn into females. All of that is natural in their world.
Great video