Alternative reproductive strategies and the maintenance of female color polymorphism in damselflies.

ABSTRACT: Genetic polymorphisms are powerful model systems to study the maintenance of diversity in nature. In some systems, polymorphisms are limited to female coloration; these are thought to have arisen as a consequence of reducing male mating harassment, commonly resulting in negative frequency-dependent selection on female color morphs. One example is the damselfly Ischnura elegans, which shows three female color morphs and strong sexual conflict over mating rates. Here, we present research integrating male tactics, and female evolutionary strategies (female mating behavior and morph-specific female fecundity) in populations with different morph-specific mating frequencies, to obtain an understanding of mating rates in nature that goes beyond the mere measure of color frequencies. We fou

SUBMITTER: Sanchez-Guillen RA 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC5552903 | biostudies-literature | 2017 Aug

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature