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Selection on male size, leg length and condition during mate search in a sexually highly dimorphic orb-weaving spider

  • Behavioural Ecology
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Abstract

Mate search plays a central role in hypotheses for the adaptive significance of extreme female-biased sexual size dimorphism (SSD) in animals. Spiders (Araneae) are the only free-living terrestrial taxon where extreme SSD is common. The “gravity hypothesis” states that small body size in males is favoured during mate search in species where males have to climb to reach females, because body length is inversely proportional to achievable speed on vertical structures. However, locomotive performance of males may also depend on relative leg length. Here we examine selection on male body size and leg length during mate search in the highly dimorphic orb-weaving spider Argiope aurantia, using a multivariate approach to distinguish selection targeted at different components of size. Further, we investigate the scaling relationships between male size and energy reserves, and the differential loss of reserves. Adult males do not feed while roving, and a size-dependent differential energy storage capacity may thus affect male performance during mate search. Contrary to predictions, large body size was favoured in one of two populations, and this was due to selection for longer legs. Male size was not under selection in the second population, but we detected direct selection for longer third legs. Males lost energy reserves during mate search, but this was independent of male size and storage capacity scaled isometrically with size. Thus, mate search is unlikely to lead to selection for small male size, but the hypothesis that relatively longer legs in male spiders reflect a search-adapted morphology is supported.

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Acknowledgements

We thank James Grant, Grant Brown, Paul Albert, Wolf Blanckenhorn and one anonymous reviewer for helpful comments on the manuscript. Jamie Dubois, Catherine Pollock and Genevieve Ring assisted the field work. We are grateful to the family Minder for letting us work on their property on Île Perrot. This study was supported by grants to D.J.F. from the Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada and a doctoral scholarship to M.W.F. from the Fonds pour la Formation de Chercheurs et l’Aide à la Recherche de Québec.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Biology, Concordia University, 7141 Sherbrooke West, Montreal, Quebec, H4B 1R6, Canada

    Matthias W. Foellmer

  2. Department of Biology, St. Mary’s University, 923 Robie Street, Halifax, Nova Scotia, B3H 3C3, Canada

    Matthias W. Foellmer

  3. Department of Biology, University of California, Riverside, CA, 92521, USA

    Daphne J. Fairbairn

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  1. Matthias W. Foellmer
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  2. Daphne J. Fairbairn
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Correspondence to Matthias W. Foellmer.

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Foellmer, M.W., Fairbairn, D.J. Selection on male size, leg length and condition during mate search in a sexually highly dimorphic orb-weaving spider. Oecologia 142, 653–662 (2005). https://doi.org/10.1007/s00442-004-1756-3

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