Human behaviour is fascinating, and it's around this time of year - February 14 to be precise - that homo sapiens in many countries engage in a curious ritual: the Valentine's Day gift exchange.

Whether it be cards, chocolate, roses, plush toys, a love fern or diamonds (if you're fancy or serious); they appear to be tokens aimed at acknowledging you, wooing you, keeping you or just consumerist obligation.

But Homo sapiens aren't alone in giving gifts to their partners - we've observed many animals act in the same way and bestow tokens of their affection to their bae.

Love gifts that are, arguably, better than roses.

#betterthanroses.

To the Adelie Penguin, pebbles are one of their most prized possessions.

Stones are in demand - the penguins use them to build nests and they're hard to find on the Antarctic Coast.

The penguins often fight over them, and steal stones from each other's nests.

During courtship, a male penguin presents female with a pebble as a gift.

If she accepts his gift, they couple up and mate for life.

From an evolutionary biology perspective, we can look at these nuptial gifts through the lens of Parental Investment Theory - effort parents go to that will benefit their offspring.

The male is providing a gift to a female that increases her "reproductive output" - the gifts attract females and facilitate... some action.

And gifts are given elsewhere in the animal kingdom.

In Northern Australia and Papua New Guinea, male Bowerbirds build complex nests (or "bowers") to try and woo females.

The nest is made mainly of sticks and decorated with whatever bling the male can find - shells, flower petals and even bits of rubbish.

They're the ultimate hoarders who arrange their trinkets in a specific pattern to woo the female into the bower - so they can see their swag before they reach the male bird.

Research suggests the geometry of the bower is directly related to the mating success of the builder - if built to give the correct perspective, the nest makes the male bird appear bigger.

And well, that leads to more reproductive success.

Outside of the bird world, a species of South American spider gives love presents too.

Males offer female spiders an item of prey that's wrapped in silk.

And the larger the gift, the better their chance of mating.

Aside from the size of the dead insect, chemical signals found within the layer of silk influenced whether the female would accept the gift.

Kind of romantic?

Even after you've found a partner and are no longer dating, the gifts don't have to stop.

Take seahorses for example.

When courting, the male seahorses will fight for female attention, but once they've found a mate is when the gift-giving really begins.

The females give their eggs to the males, who then fertilize them and carry the young to term.

This means that the males, instead of the females like in most species, eventually give birth to anywhere from 5 to 2500 baby seahorses, depending on the subspecies.

So you don't necessarily have to get your partner something expensive.

Sometimes the best gift is just doing something nice for them.

Back in the realm of Homo sapiens, economic research suggests that the materialistic tone of Valentine's Day make it a holiday loved and a holiday loathed.

And psychology studies tracking couples throughout the year have found that relationships are more likely to break up in the weeks following the holiday.

When all hope seems lost, thankfully, we have nature to turn to.

The giving and receiving of gifts is a ritual that takes place in all societies and even the animal kingdom - just in different forms.

This year, consider the unique gifts of nice pebbles, a dead insect, carefully curated rubbish or some shells; for a token of your appreciation truly inspired by nature.

It really is the thought that counts.