Horny, but size not be-all of mating
LISTEN up, guys – the good news is that size doesn’t count and that the fair sex prefer a lover to a fighter.
Um... did I mention that you also have to be a horned
flour-beetle,
This is the finding of an international study by scientists at the University of Exeter and universities of Okayama and Tsukuba in Japan that has just been published in the journal Proceedings of the Royal Society B.
The researchers looked at the complicated sexual conflict over mating in this horned beetle species and found that the females prefer courtship over competitiveness and that the size of the males’ mandibles didn’t matter at all.
Male horned beetles have enlarged lower jaws – mandibles – that they use to fight rivals for females’ attention, and those with larger mandibles do have a mating advantage when there is direct male-male competition, explained a press release about the research.
But until now it hasn’t been clear whether the females prefer these highly competitive males.
After conducting experiments with hundreds of the insects, the researchers showed that the female beetles chose male courtship over mandible size, and that the two traits are not physically or genetically correlated.
“A major finding of this study was that the most attractive males, those most preferred by females, were not the highly competitive males with large mandibles,” explained Professor Dave Hosken of the Centre for Ecology and Conservation at the University of Exeter.
“This is despite the fact these fighter males enjoy significant mating advantages when in direct competition for females. Instead, females prefer to mate with males that court more. This shows that choice and competition favour different traits.”
Now, will someone please show that this applies to mammal species as well?