Why are female insects more aggressive and bite more than the male ones, but most male mammals are more aggressive and tend to fight more?

Question

Why are female insects more aggressive and bite more than the male ones, but most male mammals are more aggressive and tend to fight more?

In: Biology

Answer 1

To propagate a species to the next generation you need most of the females to reproduce – but you don’t need that many males.

500 women and one man can produce 500 babies a year. The inverse can only produce one baby.

This has produced significant sexual dimorphism in a lot of species. Males must compete for mating rights (often at the expense of their own survivability) while females are more survival focused.

In insects this sometimes gets quite extreme – the females are larger and more powerful and the males are tiny and exist for little purpose other than mating.

Mammals have largely gone in the opposite direction – intense competition among males has produced larger and more powerful males that can drive off all challengers and any predators. Humans are a moderate example of this, but it can be quite extreme in some species – a dominant male gorilla is twice the size of an adult female.