nounplural noun hemipenes

• Each of the paired male reproductive organs in snakes and lizards.

  ‘Despite these anatomical differences, amniote penises and hemipenes share some basic similarities: they are all more or less cylindrical, and they are all hydrostatic.’

  More example sentences

  • ‘Sex was determined by everting the hemipenes of males.’
  • ‘Our studies on gartersnakes (Thamnophis sirtalis parietalis) reveal significant morphological asymmetry in this system: testes, kidneys, and hemipenes on the right-hand-side of the body are larger than those on the left.’
  • ‘We sexed each snake by probing its cloaca to detect the presence of hemipenes.’
  • ‘Sharks do have paired structures for injecting sperm, called hemipenes.’