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Behavioral Ecology Advance Access published online on December 3, 2007
Behavioral Ecology, doi:10.1093/beheco/arm121
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© The Author 2007. Published by Oxford University Press on behalf of the International Society for Behavioral Ecology. All rights reserved. For permissions, please e-mail: journals.permissions@oxfordjournals.org

Identifying a causal agent of sexual selection on weaponry in an insect

Clint D. Kelly

Department of Biology, University of Toronto at Mississauga, Mississauga, Ontario, Canada L5L 1C6 and School of Botany and Zoology, Australian National University, Canberra, ACT, Australia 0200

Address correspondence to C.D. Kelly, who is now at Department of Psychology, Dalhousie University, Halifax, NS Canada B3H 4J1. E-mail: clintkelly{at}dal.ca.


  Abstract

In many animal species, males do not seek females directly but instead locate and defend sites that contain spatially or temporally limited resources essential to female survival and reproduction. Resident males that successfully repel conspecific rivals can mate with females attracted to these resources. In theory, increasing resource value increases harem size and thus increases the opportunity (Imates) for and strength of sexual selection on traits crucial to male resource-holding potential and mating success. I experimentally tested this hypothesis in the field using the Wellington tree weta, Hemideina crassidens (Orthoptera: Tettigonioidea: Anostostomatidae), a sexually dimorphic insect in which males use their enlarged mandibles as weapons in male–male contests over access to females sheltering in tree cavities (galleries). By manipulating gallery size, I showed that, compared with smaller galleries, larger galleries housed larger harems. Variation in gallery size was an important determinant of Imates, but contrary to expectation, greater opportunity existed in small galleries compared with large galleries. As predicted, male weapon size was under stronger directional selection in large galleries because the fitness benefits were greater under these conditions compared with small galleries. My results help explain the positive association between average weapon size and average gallery size observed within and among tree weta populations in New Zealand.

Key words: conservation, Hemideina, longitudinal study, resource defense, selection gradient, sexual dimorphism.

Received 31 July 2007; revised 13 October 2007; accepted 22 October 2007.


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Sperm investment in relation to weapon size in a male trimorphic insect?
Behav. Ecol., September 1, 2008; 19(5): 1018 - 1024.
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