Spermatophore and sperm allocation in males of the monandrous butterfly pararge aegeria: the female’s perspective
(2011) Ethology (Print) — Vol. 117, n° 7, p. 645-654 (2011)
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- n insects, spermatophore production represents a non-trivial cost to a male. Non-virgin males have been shown to produce small spermato- phores at subsequent matings. Particularly in monandrous species, it may be an issue to receive a sufficiently large spermatophore at the first and typically only mating. Females of the monandrous Speckled wood butterfly Pararge aegeria (L.) produce fewer offspring after mating with a non-virgin male. After mating, females spend all their active time select- ing oviposition sites and typically ignore other males. Here, we show that females did not discriminate between a virgin male and a recently mated male in our laboratory experiments. We demonstrate that the number of eupyrene sperm bundles relative to spermatophore mass dif- fered with subsequent male matings. Males transferred a significantly smaller spermatophore after the first copulation, but the spermatophore mass did not decrease further with subsequent matings. However, the number of eupyrene sperm bundles decreased linearly. Therefore, there was proportionally more eupyrene sperm in the male’s second sperma- tophore compared with the first and the later spermatophores. Such a pattern has been shown in polyandrous species. Hence, it suggests that differences in sperm allocation strategy between polyandrous and mon- androus butterflies may be quantitative rather than qualitative. There was also a tendency for females that had mated with a recently mated male to have higher propensity to remate than did females that had mated with a virgin male. We discuss the results relative to the mating system in P. aegeria, including female remating opportunities in the field and male mate-locating behaviour.
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Vande Velde, L., Damiens, D., & Van Dyck, H. (2011). Spermatophore and sperm allocation in males of the monandrous butterfly pararge aegeria: the female’s perspective. Ethology (Print), 117(7), 645-654. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1439-0310.2011.01914.x (Original work published 2011)