You Are What You Eat: Food Limitation Affects Reproductive Fitness in a Sexually Cannibalistic Praying Mantid

Abstract

Resource limitation during the juvenile stages frequently results in developmental delays and reduced size at maturity, and dietary restriction during adulthood can affect longevity and reproductive output. Variation in food intake can also result in alteration to the normal pattern of resource allocation among body parts or life-history stages. My primary aim in this study was to determine how varying juvenile and/or adult feeding regimes affect particular female and male traits in the sexually cannibalistic praying mantid Pseudomantis albofimbriata. Praying mantids are sit-and-wait predators whose resource intake can vary dramatically depending on environmental conditions within and across seasons, making them useful for studying the effects of feeding regime on various facets of reproductive fitness. In this study, there was a significant trend/difference in development and morphology for males and females as a result of juvenile feeding treatment, however, its effect on the fitness components measured for males was much greater than on those measured for females. Food-limited males were less likely to find a female during field enclosure experiments and smaller males were slower at finding a female in field-based experiments, providing some of the first empirical evidence of a large male size advantage for scrambling males. Only adult food limitation affected female fecundity, and the ability of a female to chemically attract males was also most notably affected by adult feeding regime (although juvenile food limitation did play a role). Furthermore, the significant difference/trend in all male traits and the lack of difference in male trait ratios between treatments suggests a proportional distribution of resources and, therefore, no trait conservation by food-limited males. This study provides evidence that males and females are under different selective pressures with respect to resource acquisition and is also one of very few to show an effect of juvenile food quantity on adult reproductive fitness in a hemimetabolous insect.

Developmental Patterns inStagmomantis limbata(Mantodea: Mantidae): Variation in Instar Number, Growth, and Body Size

“…For T. angustipennis Saussure, Matsura et al (1975) suggest a positive relationship between body length and ootheca (egg case) mass. For Pseudomantis albofimbriata Stål, Barry (2013) indicates that longer adult females are more attractive to males than shorter females. In Stagmomantis limbata Hahn, female pronotum length positively correlates with prey size in the field, as well as fecundity and ootheca mass (Maxwell & Frinchaboy, in press).…”

Sexual signals for the colour‐blind: cryptic female mantids signal quality through brightness

“…The high‐quantity females ( n = 43) received three small crickets Acheta domestica three times per week, and the low‐quantity females ( n = 52) received one small cricket three times per week. These regimes are commonly used in praying mantid studies as they consistently result in adults from each end of the natural body condition spectrum (Barry , , Barry, in press Holwell & Herberstein ). Feeding regimes continued for a period of 3 weeks, after which body mass was again recorded.…”

Chemical signalling and context dependent polyandry in the false garden mantid Pseudomantis albofimbriata (Mantodea: Mantidae)

“…). On the other hand, polyandry is quite possible because numerous males are often attracted to the initial pheromone plume of a calling unmated female (Barry ; Barry ; Barry ; Barry & Wilder ; Lelito & Brown ; Maxwell et al . ; Maxwell et al .…”

“…Here, we investigate the occurrence and/or frequency of single vs. multiple mating in the false garden mantid ( P. albofimbriata ). Previous studies have shown that female P. albofimbriata can attract either one or more males to the initial pheromone plume (Barry ; Barry ; Barry & Wilder ), however, the frequency of single vs. multiple male attractions and how often multiple male attractions lead to real multiple matings has yet to be determined. Further, previous studies have shown that mated females become chemically unattractive to subsequent males (Barry et al .…”