Organisms with more than 2 sexes

[BiologyIs4Life]

:shock: Humans have three sexes. Because you have your male, female, and hermafadites the people that are both sexes. right

That's very rare though! I saw it once on the Discovery Channel..*laughs*, but He had.. well... both of "them" but he looked like a man..lol.. and he said "I've always known deep in my heart, I am a MALE " loool..and yeah, he got surgery done lol don't know how that worked out...

[February Beetle]

Usually when a baby if born with both sexes they operate and 'pick one' usually whichever one is the easiest, and then on some of the shows I've seen once that child is an adult or teenager they are very much like the opposite sex and believe they picked the wrong one.
I don't see why that is funny...

Is there ever any birth defects that come out YY? There isn't, is there? There is XXY or XYY right? but the way it is explained to me 'if there is a Y chromosome then it is a male, even if it has two XX's. if there lacks a Y then it is female' this is supposed to be no matter what the person looks like, if they fail to produce gametes etc... but I don't know if that is incorrect or way too vague.

[amoebapower]

banana slugs are hermaphrodites but intrestingly enough, they mate to reproduce

[amoebapower]

i dont believe there animals with 3 sexes, and i asked my friend who is a phd in biology, and she confirmed what i thought

[February Beetle]

banana slugs are hermaphrodites but intrestingly enough, they mate to reproduce

I think many hermaphrodites do that. I also think these ones sperm and egg mature at different rates to have different individuals mating with each other but it lets the organism reproduce more. (I think Earthworms do this, too.)

[anilzor]

"Think outside the box"

I think that the answer is to be found in the question: What is the defenition of "sex" ?

However.

the clam shrimp Eulimnadia texana has three sexes, that is, it is a triploid organism.

harvester ant "genus Pogonomyrmex" has three sexes or maybe four sexes according to some scientists

[david23]

the third sex would have to have normal reproduction capabilities with the other 2 as well. This third sex cant be a mistake either, and has to be an evolutionarily fit organism.

[Darby]

Some organisms like slime molds can have up to 9 gender types, but I'm not certain exactly how these are defined - I know that certain matches are possible, certain ones aren't, and some are preferred.

[kotoreru]

Oh, like + and - yeast spore types? (could be thinking of wrong thing, or just be incredibly wrong).

[canalon]

There are organisms with more than 2 sexes. The record seem to be around 20000 for some slime molds.

For more info, and because I do not feel like copying the bibliography here, I strongly suggest the reading Dr Tatiana's sex advice to all creation.