Animals Who Are Lethal Lovers

If you thought dating as a human was hard, guess again. These animals’ sex lives are literally lethal.

By: Thom Fusco

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Octopuses

While it’s not frequent that an octopus would eat its mate, it’s also not uncommon either. Since octopuses spend most of their time lurking at the bottom of the ocean, there’s no way of really knowing how many octopuses eat their mates or at what frequency. There have been accounts of octopuses strangling their partners to death during intercourse, though. Very BTK…

Black Widow Spiders

Black Widow spiders may be the most ironically known for their risky sexual habits. While some smaller male partners try to run away from their larger female counterparts as they try to devour them, others seem to welcome it. They seemingly toss themselves onto their female partners fangs, sacrificing themselves for love like Romeo and Juliet.

Antechinus

For the antechinus, hormones are literally the death of them. During mating season, males will go on mating sprees for as long as 14 hours. After a day with the ladies, his hormone surge takes a turn for the worse. The skyrocketed stress hormones burn out their immune system and they completely give out.

Preying Mantis

Preying Mantises turn a roll in the hay into a battle to the death. Female mantises turn a passionate moment into snack time as they feast on the brains of their lover. Mating is a lot of work, so she needs to eat her partner for nourishment. We get it, snack time is important!

Salmon

Spawning is part of the circle of life for salmon. These fish die in the same place they were born. You may say your kids are going to be the death of you, but salmon literally die after a “big bang” reproduction at their well-traveled spawning ground.