Patterns of sperm allocation across successive ejaculates in four species of voles (Microtus)

Pierce, John D.; Ferguson, B.; Salo, Allen L.; Sawrey, D. Kim; Shapiro, Lawrence E.; Taylor, Stephen A.; Dewsbury, Donald A.

doi:10.1530/jrf.0.0880141

Cited by 29 publications

(19 citation statements)

References 32 publications

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“…, 2003). relative testes size values used were taken from Kenagy & Trombulak (1986), based on the regression equation for the relationship between log body mass and log testes mass for rodents, or calculated from the same regression equation using body and testes mass data from later published sources (Pierce et al. , 1990).…”

Section: Sperm Competition Levelmentioning

confidence: 99%

Sperm competition and diversity in rodent copulatory behaviour

Stockley

Preston

2004

Journal of Evolutionary Biology

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The copulatory behaviour of male mammals is characterized by striking diversity in patterns of copulatory stimulation and ejaculation frequency. We conducted comparative analyses of rodents to investigate the potential influence of sperm competition in the evolution of copulatory behaviour. We found that increasing sperm competition is associated with faster rates of stimulation and earlier ejaculation among species in which males perform multiple intromissions prior to ejaculation, but with no overall change in the number of intromissions per ejaculation. Increasing sperm competition is also associated with a higher frequency of repeated ejaculations with the same female, and with shorter refractory periods between repeated copulations. Increasing sperm competition level thus appears to select for male ability to ejaculate more rapidly and more frequently with each female mated. As prolonged copulations are known to reduce female remating rates, these findings indicate that males may experience opposing selection pressures on copulatory behaviour with respect to offensive and defensive aspects of sperm competition. We conclude that sperm competition is likely to be an important selection pressure explaining diversity in mammalian copulatory behaviour.

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Section: Sperm Competition Levelmentioning

confidence: 99%

Sperm competition and diversity in rodent copulatory behaviour

Stockley

Preston

2004

Journal of Evolutionary Biology

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“…Harcourt et al 1981;Kenagy & Trombulak 1986;Ginsberg & Rubenstein 1990;Hosken 1997). Furthermore, mammalian species with relatively larger testes do indeed produce ejaculates containing more sperm (Møller 1988;Pierce et al 1990) and, within species, larger testes enhance male reproductive success (Preston et al 2003;Schulte-Hostedde & Millar 2004). Increasingly, molecular methods enable researchers to identify multiply sired litters in natural populations and this provides an alternative means to assess associations with sperm competition (Gomendio et al 1998).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Sperm competition and the evolution of male reproductive anatomy in rodents

2005

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Sperm competition is a pervasive selective force in evolution, shaping reproductive anatomy, physiology and behaviour. Here, we present comparative evidence that varying sperm competition levels account for variation in the male reproductive anatomy of rodents, the largest and most diverse mammalian order. We focus on the sperm-producing testes and the accessory reproductive glands, which produce the seminal fluid fraction of the ejaculate. We demonstrate a positive association between relative testis size and the prevalence of within-litter multiple paternity, consistent with previous analyses in which relative testis size has been found to correlate with sperm competition levels inferred from social organization and mating systems. We further demonstrate an association between sperm competition level and the relative size of at least two accessory reproductive glands: the seminal vesicles and anterior prostate. The size of the major product of these glands-the copulatory plug-is also found to vary with sperm competition level. Our findings thus suggest that selection for larger plugs under sperm competition may explain variation in accessory gland size, and highlight the need to consider both sperm and non-sperm components of the male ejaculate in the context of post-copulatory sexual selection.

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“…However, there is striking variation among species in sperm size (reviews by Sivinski 1980;Cummins and Woodall 1985;Jamieson 1987Jamieson , 1991Joly et al 1991), and male ejaculate delivery strategies other than "fill females to capacity" and "mate with as many females as possible" do exist (Dewsbury 1982;Parker 1984;Svard and Wicklund 1986;Pierce et al 1990; Pitnick and Markow 1994).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Operational sex ratios and sperm limitation in populations of Drosophila pachea

Pitnick

1993

Behav Ecol Sociobiol

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Males of the cactophilic fruitfly, Drosophila pachea, produce relatively few but very large sperm, and partition their limited gamete numbers among successive mates. The present study found that males take 10 days longer than females, post-eclosion, to become sexually mature. The pattern of testes development suggests that the need to produce testes long enough to manufacture the giant sperm is the cause of the delayed male maturity. These findings generate the prediction that the operational sex ratio (OSR) of populations will be female-biased. The size, sex ratio, and OSR of natural populations were examined. In general, local populations tended to be small and sex ratios tended to be slightly male-biased. However, as predicted, the OSR of populations, at least in one season, tended to be female-biased, with an average of 2.3 receptive females for each sexually active male. Results of laboratory experiments to determine the relationship between female remating frequency and fitness, and between population OSR and productivity, suggest that natural populations with female-biased OSRs are sperm-limited. The origin and maintenance of sperm gigantism and the unusual sperm-partitioning behavior of males are discussed with respect to population structure.

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Patterns of sperm allocation across successive ejaculates in four species of voles (Microtus)

Cited by 29 publications

References 32 publications

Sperm competition and diversity in rodent copulatory behaviour

Sperm competition and diversity in rodent copulatory behaviour

Sperm competition and the evolution of male reproductive anatomy in rodents

Operational sex ratios and sperm limitation in populations of Drosophila pachea

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