Abstract
The Buffalo weaver is a unique species of bird. Males possess a phalloid organ near the cloaca in the lower abdomen. The birds live in colonies in sub‐Sahara African regions. During copulation the male rubs the phalloid organ around the outside of the female's cloaca. This can last up to 30 minutes before the male appears to experience an orgasm under intense shaking of the whole body and ejaculates. The phalloid organ is up to 17 mm long and about 5 mm in diameter. It consists of bundles of skeletal muscle fibres arranged in longitudinal direction but does not contain any sperm duct. The thin skin on the surface is sparsely covered with small feathers. Bundles of myelinated nerve fibres of about 8 μm diameter run through the connective tissue of the dermis. Using light and electron microscopy, small Herbst corpuscles are found within the dermis of the skin near the bulb of the feathers. Herbst corpuscles consist of a terminal axon placed in an inner core formed of thin cytoplasmic lamellae of terminal glial cells surrounded by a capsule of thin perineural cells. The subcapsular space between the inner core and the capsule is filled with thin collagen fibrils and intercellular substance.
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