Strategic mating effort in a simultaneous hermaphrodite |
| |
Authors: | Email author" target="_blank">Tim?JanickeEmail author Halil?Kesselring Lukas?Sch?rer |
| |
Institution: | (1) Zoological Institute, University of Basel, Basel, Switzerland;(2) Centre d’Ecologie Fonctionnelle et Evolutive, CNRS-UMR 5175, 1919 Route de Mende, 34293 Montpellier Cedex 05, France |
| |
Abstract: | Sexual selection theory for simultaneously hermaphroditic animals predicts an overall preference for inseminating partners
that have a relatively higher female fecundity. Previous work on the link between male mating decisions and female fecundity
has primarily focused on the effect of the partners’ body size using existing variation in this trait within a study population.
On the assumption that the body size is positively correlated with female fecundity, sperm donors should preferentially inseminate
relatively larger individuals to obtain a higher fitness gain through their male sex function. However, empirical evidence
for such size-dependent mate choice in simultaneous hermaphrodites is equivocal, possibly because of confounding variables.
We studied the mating behavior of the simultaneously hermaphroditic flatworm Macrostomum lignano and tested for a strategic mating effort in response to the feeding status of the partner. We experimentally manipulated
the feeding status of potential mating partners in order to generate variation in female fecundity among them and tested whether
this affected the copulation number and the number of sperm that the focal worm managed to store in the partner’s sperm storage
organ. We found that the manipulation of the feeding status had a strong effect on the body size of the potential mating partners
and that focal worms copulated more frequently with, and stored more sperm in well-fed partners compared to unfed partners.
Our results suggest that M. lignano adjusts its mating effort in response to the feeding status of the mating partner. |
| |
Keywords: | |
本文献已被 SpringerLink 等数据库收录! |
|