Published in the May 2013 issue

Cheat how? On their taxes? At cards? I will take your silence to mean that you're asking if animals have affairs, and if that's the case, what I have to tell you may come as a surprise: Only 3 percent of mammals, which I'm pretty sure most animals are, are monogamous. The other 97 percent say only that it's complicated.

Of the animals in committed relationships, some do cheat, but only when there's a good reason and it doesn't interfere with their main activity: murder (or, as they call it, "eating"). Birds are the real dogs. "There's a lot of evidence of females moving off the area they share with the male at first light int he morning and going over to a neighboring territory, mating with a neighboring male, and coming back," says biologist David Westneat, who specializes in avian social and reproductive behavior. "They're mating with males that have some qualities that appear to be better than their pair-bonded mates'... a more elaborate song, a brighter plumage, or they're bigger or older." So like I said, when there's a good reason. It seems the only animal that never cheats is the California mouse, which I suspect is because no one wants to fuck it.

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Essentially, it's almost impossible to determine what constitutes animal infidelity (or, as they call it, "rape"), but for what it's worth, I'd like to say that I've known some very faithful pigs.


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