Bats Are Great At Sex & Love Foreplay

Cunnilingus comes AFTER sex. Need we say more?

It’s common knowledge that bats are nocturnal, but what you may not know about them is this: When they go out at night, they’re going out to get laid. And they’re having better sex than most humans can ever dream of. Oral sex isn’t common amongst animals. In 2014, two male bears in Croatia were spotted orally servicing each other 28 times over the course of just a few days. But this is not normal bear behavior. Bonobos also perform frequent oral sex, but experts chalk this up to adolescent males fooling around rather than any kind of real sexual engagement. Contrast this, then, with the mating process of fruit bats, which reads like something out of a 90s teen comedy. First, the male bat must secure a location; he does this by constructing a tent out of leaves and other foliage. Then he invites all of the female fruit bats in his contact list over to his sweet new pad. This is when things start to get zany. One of the female fruit bats generally initiates contact. She approaches the male fruit bat, sniffing his face and neck to show her interest. After some erotic face licking, the bats get down to business, with the female often starting the process by performing fellatio on the male. Much like with human foreplay, bat foreplay has a positive effect on the length and quality of sex. And proving once again that fruit bats are more evolved than humans, bats don’t dine and dash: After sex, the male and female hang out and groom themselves together. Even more to their credit, male bats aren’t selfish lovers — they can dish it out as well as take it. A 2013 study focusing on the mating habits of the Indian flying fox (which is a kind of bat, not a fox) shows that males use their tongues to pleasure their female mates both before and after sex. In fact, researchers observed that male bats in this species go down on female bats for about twice as long after sex as before it. Listen closely: That sound you just heard was women collectively sitting up and taking notice. There are many reasons why bats engage in oral sex. Scientists speculate that it can be used for lubrication, stimulation or to sanitize the genitals. Cunnilingus in particular may also be necessary to the survival of the species: Male bats do it partly to remove old sperm from their female partners as a way of ensuring that their own sperm prevails and is passed on. Regardless of their motives, I think we can all agree by this point that bats are the new patron saints of getting it on.