Time constraints and multiple choice criteria in the sampling behaviour and mate choice of the fiddler crab, Uca annulipes

Backwell, Patricia R. Y.; Passmore, N. I.

doi:10.1007/s002650050258

Cited by 251 publications

(183 citation statements)

References 31 publications

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“…In several ¢ddlers, sampling females are only seen in high numbers for a few days in each cycle (e.g. Uca annulipes (Backwell & Passmore 1996); Uca pugilator (Christy 1978)). These periods of peak sampling activity seem to coincide with the point in the cycle when females must mate if there is to be su¤cient time for subsequent embryonic development before larval release at the next nocturnal spring tide.…”

Section: (B) Female Behaviourmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Females that burrow mate must ¢rst leave their own burrow and wander on the surface. While wandering, they sequentially enter and leave the burrows of several males (`sampling') before remaining in the chosen male's burrow (Christy & Schober 1994;Backwell & Passmore 1996). Surface mating occurs when a female is approached by a male neighbour or a wandering, burrowless male.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…This can take the form of variation in the propensity to sample mates (Backwell & Passmore 1996), criteria for mate acceptance (Johnstone et al 1996), resistance to forced copulation attempts (Arnqvist 1992), the propensity to mate-choice copy (Dugatkin & Godin 1993), or the frequency of deployment of di¡erent sampling tactics (Gibson & Langen 1996). Sometimes discrete mating categories are de¢ned based on male type or mating location.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Elevated predation risk changes mating behaviour and courtship in a fiddler crab

Koga

Backwell

Jennions

et al. 1998

Proc. R. Soc. Lond. B

146

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The ¢ddler crab, Uca beebei, lives in individually defended burrows, in mixed-sex colonies on intertidal mud £ats. Avian predation is common, especially of crabs unable to escape into burrows. Mating pairs form in two ways. Females either mate on the surface at their burrow entrance (`surface mating') or leave their own burrow and sequentially enter and leave (`sample') courting males' burrows, before staying in one to mate underground (`burrow mating'). We tested whether perceived predation risk a¡ects the relative frequency of these mating modes. We ¢rst observed mating under natural levels of predation during one biweekly, semi-lunar cycle. We then experimentally increased the perceived predation risk by attracting grackles (Quiscalus mexicanus) to each half of the study site in two successive biweekly cycles. In each experimental cycle, crabs were signi¢cantly less likely to mate on the side with more birds. Moreover, on the side with elevated predation risk, the number of females leaving burrows to sample was greatly reduced relative to the number of females that surface-mated. Males waved less and built fewer mud pillars, which attract females, when birds were present. We discuss several plausible proximate explanations for these results and the e¡ect of changes in predation regime on sexual selection.

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Section: (B) Female Behaviourmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

See 1 more Smart Citation

Elevated predation risk changes mating behaviour and courtship in a fiddler crab

Koga

Backwell

Jennions

et al. 1998

Proc. R. Soc. Lond. B

146

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

show abstract

“…Similarly, once a male has directed claw waving to a female, she may be more likely to approach if his burrow is marked with a hood (Christy, 1988b;Crane, 1975;von Hagen, 1968). Finally, hoods may signal either male or burrow quality (Backwell and Passmore, 1996;Backwell et al, 1995;Christy, 1983Christy, , 1987 and increase the probability that a female will mate with a male once she reaches his burrow. Thus, hood builders may have higher mating rates because they are more likely to encounter and court females, to attract the females they court, and to mate with the females that they attract.…”

Section: Effects Of Hoods On Courtshipmentioning

confidence: 99%

Sexual selection for structure building by courting male fiddler crabs: an experimental study of behavioral mechanisms

Christy¹

2002

Behavioral Ecology

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Males of the fiddler crab Uca musica sometimes build sand hoods at the entrances of their burrows, to which they attract females for mating with claw waving and other displays. Females significantly more often approached males with hoods than males without hoods, but once at a burrow, they were just as likely to stay and mate whether the male had a hood or not. To determine how hoods affect male attractiveness, we conducted experiments that controlled for other differences in courtship behavior between builders and nonbuilders; we removed hood builders' hoods and we added hood models to nonbuilders' burrows. We then measured the attractiveness of hood builders and nonbuilders with and without hoods. Neither manipulation measurably affected male courtship behavior. The presence of a hood did not increase male-female encounter rates, suggesting that hoods do not attract distant females into a male's courtship range. However, once a male courted a female, she was significantly more likely to approach if he had a real or model hood. We obtained direct evidence that females orient to hoods by replacing them with hood models positioned about 3 cm away from the openings to males' burrows. Females approached the models, not the courting males, about 27% of the time. We conclude that hood building is sexually selected because courted females differentially approach hoods, not because hoods attract distant females and not because females prefer to mate with hood builders.

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“…For example, when a species colonizes a new area that is already occupied by closely related species, females may initially be courted pri-marily by heterospecific males and only rarely encounter a conspecific male because of their low relative abundance. In the laboratory, female acquiescence to mating with a heterospecific male is often seen in no-choice breeding experiments (Crapon de Caprona 1986;Seehausen et al 1997; for a field example see also Lushai et al 2005), and females often become less selective when males with preferred phenotypes are absent (Bakker and Milinski 1991;Backwell and Passmore 1996;Bateman et al 2001;Luttbeg et al 2001). Many females may acquiesce to heterospecific matings in this situation and produce fewer or less-viable offspring than females that secure matings with conspecifics.…”

mentioning

confidence: 99%

The Evolution of Female Mating Preferences: Differentiation From Species With Promiscuous Males Can Promote Speciation

McPeek

Gavrilets

2006

Evolution

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Abstract. Females of many species are frequently courted by promiscuous males of their own and other closely related species. Such mating interactions may impose strong selection on female mating preferences to favor trait values in conspecific males that allow females to discriminate them from their heterospecific rivals. We explore the consequences of such selection in models of the evolution of female mating preferences when females must interact with heterospecific males from which they are completely postreproductively isolated. Specifically, we allow the values of both the most preferred male trait and the tolerance of females for males that deviate from this most preferred trait to evolve. Also, we consider situations in which females base their mating decisions on multiple male traits and must interact with males of multiple species. Females will rapidly differentiate in preference when they sometimes mistake heterospecific males for suitable mates, and the differentiation of female preference will select for conspecific male traits to differentiate as well. In most circumstances, this differentiation continues indefinitely, but slows substantially once females are differentiated enough to make mistakes rare. Populations of females with broader preference functions (i.e., broader tolerance for males with trait values that deviate from females' most preferred values) will evolve further to differentiate if the shape of the function cannot evolve. Also, the magnitude of separation that evolves is larger and achieved faster when conspecific males have lower relative abundance. The direction of differentiation is also very sensitive to initial conditions if females base their mate choices on multiple male traits. We discuss how these selection pressures on female mate choice may lead to speciation by generating differentiation among populations of a progenitor species that experiences different assemblages of heterospecifics. Opportunities for differentiation increase as the number of traits involved in mate choice increase and as the number of species involved increases. We suggest that this mode of speciation may have been particularly prevalent in response to the cycles of climatic change throughout the Quaternary that forced the assembly and disassembly of entire communities on a continentwide basis.

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Time constraints and multiple choice criteria in the sampling behaviour and mate choice of the fiddler crab, Uca annulipes

Cited by 251 publications

References 31 publications

Elevated predation risk changes mating behaviour and courtship in a fiddler crab

Elevated predation risk changes mating behaviour and courtship in a fiddler crab

Sexual selection for structure building by courting male fiddler crabs: an experimental study of behavioral mechanisms

The Evolution of Female Mating Preferences: Differentiation From Species With Promiscuous Males Can Promote Speciation

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