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Mating Behavior Differences and the Cost of Mating in Allonemobius fasciatus and A. socius

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Abstract

Close range prezygotic barriers are assumed to be present between sister taxa who have overlapping distributions. Here we report the results of studies designed to test the existence of prezygotic barriers between two closely related species, A. fasciatus and A. socius. We finely dissected the courtship and mating rituals and performed Monte Carlo analysis on lengths of time and number of occurrences of particular events in the courtship mating sequence. These detailed investigations of the courtship and mating behavior of conspecific and heterospecific pairs demonstrate that behavioral isolation is non-existent. We also measure the adult lifespan and number of progeny produced from singly and multiply mated males and females in conspecific and heterospecific trials. We found that cost of a heterospecific mating is asymmetric between the sexes with males paying a higher cost.

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Acknowledgements

Funding was provided by Sigma Xi, New Mexico State University Biology Departmental Fellowship, and the Environmental Protection Agency STARR/GRO Fellowship awarded to LMB as well as a GearX.com donation to LMB. JLM was supported by a grant from the Advanced Research Program of Texas (ARP 003656-0067-2001). DJH was supported by NSF (DEB 0316194 and IRCEB 0111613). Thanks go to the reviewers of this manuscript for their comments as well as to past and present denizens of the Laboratory of Ecological and Evolutionary Genetics at New Mexico State University for help rearing crickets. Thanks to Aysegul Birand, Evan Braswell, and Christin Slaughter for comments on early versions of this manuscript.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Biology, New Mexico State, Las Cruces, NM, 88003, USA

    Leanna M. Birge

  2. Carolina Wetlands Services, Inc., 5000 Nations Crossin, Suite. 230, Charlotte, NC, 28217, USA

    Andrea L. Hughes

  3. Department of Entomology, Kansas State University, Manhattan, KS, 66506, USA

    Jeremy L. Marshall

  4. Department of Biology, University of Colorado, Denver, CO, 80217, USA

    Daniel J. Howard

  5. Department of Genetics, Environment and Evolution, Galton Laboratory, University College London, Wolfson House, 4 Stephenson Way, London, NW1 2HE, UK

    Leanna M. Birge

Authors
  1. Leanna M. Birge
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  2. Andrea L. Hughes
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  3. Jeremy L. Marshall
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  4. Daniel J. Howard
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Corresponding author

Correspondence to Leanna M. Birge.

Appendix

Appendix

Table 4 Mating Sequence Summary: Lengths of Time and, or Number of Occurrences of Particular Events in the Courtship Mating Sequence. Number Under ‘Mating Sequence’ Corresponds to Verbal Description in the ‘Courtship Mating Sequence’ of the Material and Methods
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Birge, L.M., Hughes, A.L., Marshall, J.L. et al. Mating Behavior Differences and the Cost of Mating in Allonemobius fasciatus and A. socius . J Insect Behav 23, 268–289 (2010). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10905-010-9213-0

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10905-010-9213-0

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