Male mating costs in a polygynous mosquito with ornaments expressed in both sexes

Abstract

Male mate choice in species with conventional sex roles is difficult to explain and has, therefore, been the focus of many recent theoretical models. These models have focused on variance in female quality and, to a lesser extent, male investments/costs associated with mating. In this study, we investigate the costs of courtship and copulation in the polygynous mosquito Sabethes cyaneus. In this species, both males and females possess elaborate ornaments. Previous studies suggest that the most likely explanation for the presence of these ornaments is mutual mate choice. Thus, this system provides an excellent model for exploring the evolution of mutual mate choice in polygynous species. We disentangle the costs of courtship and copulation by monitoring male survival in three groups of males: housed alone (group 1); able only to court females (group 2); or able to court and copulate with females (group 3). We show that males incur a cost of courtship and copulation and that courtship intensity is negatively related to male longevity. Our results suggest that courtship and copulation carry additive costs to males. We discuss the implications of these results in the context of current mutual mate choice theory and suggest that courtship costs may be an unappreciated key factor in the evolution of male mate choice.

Biological Control of Mosquito Vectors: Past, Present, and Future

“…Further information on the parameters underlying male mating success could then be used to inform control programs to generate high quality mass-released males (in the case of SIT, boosted SIT, IIT, and RIDL) and to monitor the mating performance of Wolbachia -infected males [13,149]. It is worth noting that quantitative analyses of mating ethograms in mosquitoes are rare, and mainly focus on the elaborate courtships found in the genera Sabethes [150,151,152] and Wyeomyia [153]. The majority of studies investigating the sexual behaviour of medically important Aedes species just compare the insemination ability in sterilised and wild type males [154,155,156,157,158,159,160,161].…”

The Effects of Interspecific Courtship on the Mating Success ofAedes aegyptiandAedes albopictus(Diptera: Culicidae) Males

“…Interspecific courtship will therefore waste time, energy, and possibly gametes, as well as exposing males to increased predation risk or host defenses. Male courtship costs have been established in a number of arthropods (e.g., fruit flies (Cordts and Partridge 1996), drumming wolf spiders (Mappes et al 1996), tsetse flies (Clutton-Brock and Parker 1992), dobsonflies (Hayashi 1993), and crickets (Sakaluk 1985)) as well as for the mosquitoes Sabethes cyaneus (South et al 2009) and Anopheles freeborni Bouskila 1993, Yuval et al 1993). From an evolutionary perspective, it is therefore important for males, as well as females, to direct their courtship toward conspecifics instead of incompatible heterospecifics.…”

First report of behavioural lateralisation in mosquitoes: right-biased kicking behaviour against males in females of the Asian tiger mosquito, Aedes albopictus

“…However, information is lacking on several facets of their behavioural ecology, with special reference to courtship and mating (Oliva et al 2013(Oliva et al , 2014Lees et al 2014;Benelli 2015). In several species, mosquito females display aggressive responses against undesired males, performing rejection kicks with one or both hind legs (South et al 2009). In the Asian tiger mosquito, Aedes albopictus (Skuse), females perform rejection kicks against undesired males in 22 % of encounters (Benelli 2015).…”