Male mate choice and size-assortative pairing in a jumping spider, Phidippus clarus
Section snippets
Study Sites
All field work was conducted from 2001 to 2004 on or near the campus of the University of Massachusetts, Amherst, U.S.A., in old fields that contained a variety of grasses, shrubs and flowering plants, predominantly milkweed, Asclepias syriaca, goldenrod, Solidago spp., sweet clover, Melilotus spp., and asters, Aster spp. In 2005, male–male contests were staged at the Ecology Research Center of Miami University, Oxford, Ohio, U.S.A.
Methods
Mating systems are influenced largely by factors such as sex
Discussion
Evidence from both field and laboratory studies suggests that male mate choice is important in the jumping spider P. clarus, a species with partial sex-role reversal. In the field, I documented a dramatic swing from a male-biased to a female-biased adult sex ratio in only a few days. This situation sets the stage for sexual selection: at the start of the season, males have the opportunity to be choosy, because penultimate females, but not adult females, are common. Males should also be
Acknowledgments
I thank Christa Skow and Kate McHugh for field assistance. Christa Skow, Jeremy Houser and Liv Baker provided helpful advice during the development of this project. Ben Normark, Jeff Podos, Ron Prokopy and Paul Sievert offered helpful suggestions on all aspects of this project and manuscript. Ann Rypstra, Jen Riem, Jason Schmidt, George Uetz, Shawn Wilder, Kerri Wrinn and two anonymous referees provided helpful comments on the manuscript. Finally, I am deeply indebted to Elizabeth Jakob for the
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