Female attack is not necessary for male copulatory organ breakage in the sexually cannibalistic spider Argiope argentata (Araneae: Araneidae)

Autor:	Soledad Ghione, Fernando G. Costa
Rok vydání:	2011
Předmět:	Spider Ecology Insect Science Sexual cannibalism Argiope argentata food and beverages Zoology Sex organ Mating Biology Mating plug biology.organism_classification Sperm competition
Zdroj:	Journal of Arachnology. 39:197-200
ISSN:	1937-2396 0161-8202
Popis:	In sexually cannibalistic spiders, males usually only copulate with one female. This selects for male strategies to improve paternity success in their single mate. Male mating strategies can include genital damage during female attack in some cannibalistic orb-weaving spiders, where males are dwarf and females polyandrous. We explored whether sexual cannibalism is necessary for male genital damage in the silver spider Argiope argentata (Fabricius 1775) by performing mating trials with recently killed virgin females. We found that males can break off their copulatory organs without female intervention and spontaneously die during copulation. Results suggest that genital damage evolved in response to sperm competition in this species.
Databáze:	OpenAIRE
Externí odkaz:	https://explore.openaire.eu/search/publication?articleId=doi_________::05e871736c2a445777bfd73e3941a3f5 https://doi.org/10.1636/hi10-92.1 Zobrazit plný text záznamu Plný text ve formátu PDF