Sexual Behaviour in Male Animals

The sexual or reporductive behaviour in male animals is innate and serves as an essential component of the reproductive process. Its primary purpose is to facilitate copulation, which leads to pregnancy and ultimately the birth of offspring. This behaviour involves a complex series of endocrine and neural events.

When males reach puberty, their behaviour becomes increasingly directed towards the opposite sex. As bulls mature, signs of sexual behaviour become more evident. The pituitary gland secretes gonadotropic hormones—follicle-stimulating hormone (FSH), which maintains the seminiferous tubules and initiates spermatogenesis, and luteinizing hormone (LH), which stimulates the production of the androgenic hormone testosterone. Testosterone is responsible for sexual behaviour and the development of secondary sexual characteristics.

Unlike females, whose sexual activity is restricted to the period of estrus, males can exhibit sexual behaviour at any time.

Components of Male Reproductive Behaviour

Male reproductive behaviour is having three distinct stages/components and in each stage it is having specific events.

The stages or components of male reproductive behaviour are divided into three phases:

1. Precopulatory Behaviour
2. Copulatory Behaviour
3. Postcopulatory Behaviour

Each stage of the reproductive behaviour becomes the stimulant for the next stage.