Sex in City Plants, Animals, Fungi, and More

City plants grow spontaneously in sidewalk cracks surrounded by buildings and streets. Small invertebrates reside in walled courtyards. How do members of apparently isolated urban populations find mates? How do they avoid inbreeding? Plants and animals that inhabit cities are often common and widespread outside of cities. A rich scientific literature illuminates their systems for mating. However, this literature is scattered, and it typically focuses on locations that are not urban. This book explores the natural history of sex, from bacteria and fungi to plants and animals, excluding human beings. It focuses on cities. It examines sex as both a state of being, as in male or female, and as a process, as in mating. Compared to other forms of biodiversity, reproductive diversity is largely hidden, yet it rivals morphological diversity in beauty and scale. This book explores sex in the city as a pathway to appreciation of biodiversity. It presents many unanswered questions and hypotheses--