WARNING!: THIS POST USES LATIN WORDS TO DESCRIBE SEXUAL ORGANS.  If you
don't like reading the "p-word," (see below if you are unsure) skip this
post.  DO NOT READ PAST THIS DOT .
 
For those of you which aren't offended by the occasional use of "penis" and
have found that I have left lots of straight lines, you can make sophomoric
comments to me privately.  (Ok, my ONLY puns on the topic...)
 
I recieved 3 private e-mails asking if bones could actually be found in the
male sex organs of carnivores.  Yes they can.  This bone is called the Os
Penis (aka baculla = Os priapi = Os bacullum = Penile bone, and more) and is
a characteristic of ALL male members of the Carnivora family, (except for
the occasional genetic anomaly), many female members (where it is called the
Os clitoris), and most other mammalian families, such as primates, rodents,
bats, seals, whales, dolphins....  Well, you get the picture.  MOST male
mammals have one, many female mammals have the female version, and it is
considered an ancestral mammalian trait.
 
Rather indelicately, the function of the Os penis is quite straightforward.
In those animals in which sex is rapid and brief, the Os penis makes sure
things work rapidly.  In those animals in which sex is long and protracted,
the Os penis makes sure things work for a long time.  Like the femur, each
Os penis looks basicaly like the other: a round- or oval-rod, or a V- or
U-shaped open tube.  It can be mostly straight (canids), s-shaped (lots,
including raccoons), or curved at one end (mustelids, including ferrets).
These bones are dorsal to the urethra, that is underneath it and closer to
the ground in an upright walking animal, and sometimes grow up and around it
(the U- and V-shaped ones), so it is easy to see the bone is designed to
maintain the integrety of the urethra for the transference of biological
by-products of reproduction; whatever THAT may be....  The exact shape and
curve of the Os penis is species dependent, and the bone is used frequently
to identify the genus and age of the individual to which it once belonged.
In fact, there are scores of papers and a couple of books dedicated to such
ends; the most work being done by a mammalogist named Burt.
 
Like virtually all Carnivora, 99.995% of male ferrets have an Os penis, and
up to 68% of female ferrets have an Os clitoris.  It is usually apparent at
birth, so sexing ferrets can be done on neonates by the visually-impaired.
Push the belly between the male sexual "belly-button" and the sexually
generic "pooper-shooter;" if you feel a ridge or rod, that's the Os penis,
and the animal is a boy.  One e-mail asked if dogs had one, and the answer
is "Not if they are female." Yes, you can feel it using the described
method, but you have to push harder.  Also, they are not burrowing animals,
so they have no real reason to get stuff out of the way, so more shows.  You
might have to push closer to the...  well, you get the idea.
 
This is not a bone generally seen by the public at large, but then I doubt
that many people know that lots of cows have bones in their heart either.
Some problems that might be encountered with the Os penis is the occasional
inflamation which may include the urethra (sometimes secondary to kidney or
bladder stone problems), and fractures.  Yes, they are sometimes broken--a
greater danger than expected from wire-mesh cages-- and can cause great
problems later if healed improperly.
 
BTW, as a piece of penis-trivia, the families that include cows and deer,
elephants, and horses lack the bone, or only have small nonmorphic
ossifications, so the bull-*-cane your granddad showed you was not a bone,
but the dried organ itself.  Oh yeah, the raccoon-*-toothpick was the bone.
I once saw a Native American headdress which was decorated with about 500
mink Os penises.  The Os penis of the Raccoon was highly prized (after being
fashioned into awls) for basket weaving, and as picks for cleaning residue
from the hole in the flashpan of black-powder rifles.  Many people used
whale Os penises as clubs for killing fish or beating up people.  In Europe,
the polecat Os penis was carved into pins to hold clothing together, and
because of its density, as a quill for harpoons and hooks.  It was also
used, once sharpened, for blood-letting, until ivory became available.
 
Now you'll never be able to watch reruns of "Quantum Leap" or see Scott
Baculla on "Murphy Brown" without snickering about his name. Its just
fortunate his first name wasn't Richard....
 
Bob and the 13 Ferrets-O-Fun
[Posted in FML issue 1494]