Using a publishing platform such as WordPress makes blogging so easy, and there are lots of features that make it fun. As I wrote in this post, I love to look at the statistics and track which topics are popular and where my readers are coming from.
By this, I don’t actually mean where in the world they are coming from but rather, where in the internet they are coming from. But, while we are on the topic of geography, I actually can see the countries of my readers and that is super cool. So…
G’day, Hoi, Namaste, Hej, Dia duit, Bonjour, Assalam Alaikum, Hola, Ciao, Sannu, Olá, Hallo, Hei, Shalom, Hai, Bok, Lei hao, Pryvit, Alo, Selamat sore, Aw, Salaam, Sawatdee Kah, Nín hǎo… Hello!
I hope I got it mostly right – 34 different countries so far! It really is a world-wide web. If I stop and think about that, it blows my mind in a really enjoyable way.
But I digress, I’m meant to be talking about how the internet is getting you here. Are you linking over from Facebook, Twitter, a fellow blogger’s link or via search engine… that one’s my favourite. I LOVE seeing what search terms brought people to my site.
Most are very appropriate and understandable and I hope you were happy when your search brought you to my site. Others are very funny and it cracks me up that they led to me. Here are a few of my recent favourites:
- girlfriend found lipstick in my pocket (there were 2 versions of this)
- my husband sprained his knee
- epic bacon anecdotes
- scooby doo sexual undertones
- does passport canada have facial recognition (just in case you are planning anything fishy – YES!)
And then there is this one…
what bird has a penis?
I just can’t rest knowing that their search was so F’d up that it led them here… and they still didn’t get their answer! What if this was a kid doing a project for school? If I am half the biologist I pretend to be, I can’t have this on my conscience. So, I’ve done some research of my own and here is the quick and dirty answer. (Pun intended!)
Dear kid doing a project for school,
Thank you for your question. Interestingly, only about 3% of birds have penises. All birds (and reptiles and amphibians) have a bump called a cloaca from which they excrete waste (bird poop) and semen. For most species of birds, the male and female just bump their cloaca together and that gets the job done.
However, as I said, 3% of birds do have penises. In these cases, the penis will extend out through the cloaca to reach the female. The duck is an example of a bird that does this.
Male ducks have a penis that ain’t no ordinary penis. A duck penis is a spiral that explodes out of its cloaca. Sometimes they are even spiny, ouch! Here is a fun video that shows a slo-mo exploding duck penis…
Another interesting fact for your project is that the Argentine Lake Duck has a penis that, when it is stretched out, is longer that the bird itself. Here is a picture you can use.
The male Argentine Lake Duck and his 42.5 cm penis (Pic: K. McCracken/Nature).
Well, I hope that answers your question. Thanks for stopping by my blog!
Whew… I will now sleep easy knowing the next time someone is lost in the interwebs desperate for information about bird penises, they will not leave this site unsatisfied.
I’ll resume our regular programming tomorrow.
Escaping Elegance 
You learn something new everyday.
Now, to find a way to show off this new-fangled knowledge in refined conversation…
Ahh… the challenge of working duck sex organs into a conversation. Let me know how that goes!
Science…such fun.
Well, to be fair, it’s hard not to have fun taking about bird penises. I have yet to find a really funny organic chemistry blog…
Organic chemistry…god, my face just went numb. Hadn’t thought about that nightmare in a while. Our class was taught by a Turkish woman whose English was questionable at best. That’s always neat when you’re trying to learn something that hardly makes sense in your first language already.