This is a butterfish:



NOAA describes it unflatteringly as a "small, bony foodfish." Butterfish live along the Atlantic coast of North America from Florida to Newfoundland, and they've been fished commercially for some time, with predictable results:

José Marian, the author of this paper about sperm injection, very kindly and promptly provided me with a copy. I began reading with an enthusiasm which only increased as I proceeded through the article. It's short, clear, and tantalizing.

Squid sex is both discreet and discrete.

Discreet, because usually the sexual organs remain hidden. The only visible activity looks more like a handshake than like intercourse, as the male uses one arm to pass sperm to the female.

Discrete, because the sperm comes in neat, quantized packages rather than free-flowing semen. These packages are called spermatophores, and they're quite complex. In addition to a mass of sperm, they have a variety of tools for attaching themselves to the female's body.

My husband has an enormous head. Sometimes this concerns me, when I consider the degree to which skull size may have a genetic basis and the fact that we'll probably reproduce at some point. That has to fit through there? OW.

But maybe I should be grateful. I'll certainly have an easier time of it than female Atlantic bobtail squid (Sepiola atlantica). These mamas, according to a recent study on their spawning behavior, can lay up to one and a half times their own body weight in eggs. That would be like me, at 125 pounds, producing 187.5 pounds of baby. WOW.