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Female preference for both behavior and morphology traits of the male Japanese newt Cynops pyrrhogaster

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Abstract

Males of the Japanese newt (Cynops pyrrhogaster) display complex courtship behaviors and are sexually dimorphic in terms of tail morphology. Pair encounter experiments were conducted to investigate which males are preferred by female newts. Male courtship behavior consisted of four stages, namely, Approach, Fan, Creep and Spermatophore deposition. The Fan behavior was classified into four sub-patterns. Males which showed a specific sub-pattern were accepted at a significantly higher probability by females than males which showed the other sub-patterns. The accepted males had a smaller snout–vent length, higher tail, and larger body mass than the rejected males, and their body weight was relatively heavier. Our results suggest that females of C. pyrrhogaster select their mates based on both behavioral patterns and morphological characters.

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Acknowledgments

We would like to thank Yasuhiro Kosuge and Raita Kobayashi for invaluable field assistance, and Terutake Hayashi, Tamotsu Kusano, Masami Hasegawa, Shin Tochinai and our colleagues in the Laboratory of Animal Ecology, Department of Ecology and Systematics of Hokkaido University for providing useful advice during the course of this study. We also thank Michael Taborsky, Tim Halliday and an anonymous reviewer for helpful discussions and valuable critical comments on this paper. We acknowledge Anthony R. Chittenden and Shizuka Onishi for improving our English. This study was partly supported by a Grant in Aid from the Ministry of Education, Culture, Sports, Science, and Technology of Japan to E.H. (Nos.13440227, 26440228, 15H04420).

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  1. Laboratory of Animal Ecology, Department of Ecology and Systematics, Graduate School of Agriculture, Hokkaido University, Kita 9 Nishi 9, Kita-ku, Sapporo, 060-8589, Japan

    Takako Kutsuki & Eisuke Hasegawa

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  1. Takako Kutsuki
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  2. Eisuke Hasegawa
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Correspondence to Eisuke Hasegawa.

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Kutsuki, T., Hasegawa, E. Female preference for both behavior and morphology traits of the male Japanese newt Cynops pyrrhogaster . J Ethol 34, 337–342 (2016). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10164-016-0480-x

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10164-016-0480-x

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