Galactorrhea (which sounds like a space-related disease from a science fiction novel) is the term used to refer to milk production not associated with childbirth or nursing. I lactate, you lactate, we all lactate for galactorrhea! Echidna babies seem to latch on to these milk-secreting areas with their tiny mouths located at the end of their “beaks,” while platypus babies let the milk pool around the mother’s abdomen and lap it up.
Platypus babies are called skin#
Instead of nipples, monotremes secrete milk through specialized skin pores. These animals also have something else in common, nipple-free lactation! It makes sense if you consider their strangely-shaped snouts-the platypus’ snouts looking like duck bills and the echidnas’ looking like long narrow beaks. They belong to an order of egg-laying animals called monotreme, which also includes four species of echidnas. We already know that platypus are mammals that lay eggs, but they are not the only ones. That means that a waterproof seal isn’t extremely crucial, the milk itself isn’t easily water soluble-just imagine losing a chunk of butter or soft cheese in a cup a water.īy the way, you know you haven’t won at nerdom until you find yourself reading a scientific paper from 1940 about the composition of dolphin milk. Depending the species, the milk is composed of anywhere between 10 to 50% fat, compared to human milk’s 4.2% fat. The mother uses her muscles to help eject the milk into her baby’s mouth, while the baby uses its tongue-rather than lips-to form a seal. And yet we learn in elementary school that dolphins are mammals so we presume dolphin lactation must happen somehow in a way that isn’t entirely clear to the general public.Ĭetaceans, the group of aquatic mammals that encompasses whales and dolphins, have two retractable nipples hidden in slits on the abdomen. It’s impossible to think of milking a dolphin without chuckling. It started out innocently, with questions like “how does cow milk differ from human milk?” But pretty soon my brain started wondering things like “how do baby dolphins nurse if they have no lips?” So I did some research, and it turns out lactation in nature is even weirder than I thought. Having breastfed both of my children for a whole year each, I had a lot of time to ponder this evolutionary trait we share with our mammal cousins.
Image credit: Flickr user brisbanecitycouncil, CC BY 2.0
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