Cryptic female preference for genetically unrelated males is mediated by ovarian fluid in the guppy.

ABSTRACT: As inbreeding is costly, it has been suggested that polyandry may evolve as a means to reduce the negative fitness consequences of mating with genetically related males. While several studies provide support for this hypothesis, evidence of pure post-copulatory mechanisms capable of biasing paternity towards genetically unrelated males is still lacking; yet these are necessary to support inbreeding avoidance models of polyandry evolution. Here we showed, by artificially inseminating a group of female guppies with an equal number of sperm from related (full-sib) and unrelated males, that sperm competition success of the former was 10 per cent lower, on average, than that of the unrelated male. The paternity bias towards unrelated males was not due to differential embryo survival, as the siz

SUBMITTER: Gasparini C 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC3125622 | biostudies-literature | 2011 Aug

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature