High variation in last male sperm precedence and genital morphology in the emerald damselfly, Lestes sponsa

• In organisms in which individuals mate multiply, knowledge of the proportion of offspring sired by the last male to mate (P-2) under field conditions is important for a thorough understanding of how sexual selection works in nature. In many insect groups, pronounced intraspecific variation in P-2 is commonplace. Interestingly, however, in stark contrast to these observations, compilation of P-2 data in dragonflies and damselflies (Odonata) indicates that a high P-2, seldom below 0.95, is a feature of this taxon. Here we used double digest restriction-site associated DNA sequencing to generate a panel of single nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs) with which we could determine paternity and estimate values of P-2 in the offspring of 19 field-collected pairs of the emerald damselfly Lestes sponsa. We also estimated the relationship between P-2 and male genital shape of 16 males using geometric morphometric analysis. P-2 was variable (range = 0.0-1.0; mean = 0.5), and there was a marginally non-significant (P = 0.069) relationship between genital shape and P-2, suggesting that males with a high P-2 had an aedeagus with a broader tip. We suggest that the high P-2 -values reported in past studies in Odonata are partly due to the methods used to infer paternity. Use of SNPs to determine patterns of paternity and P-2 in odonates is needed for a better appraisal of fitness in odonates, and would open many future avenues for use of odonates as models of sexual selection.

Subject headings

NATURVETENSKAP  -- Biologi -- Evolutionsbiologi (hsv//swe)

NATURAL SCIENCES  -- Biological Sciences -- Evolutionary Biology (hsv//eng)

Keyword

ddRADseq

last male sperm precedence

P-2

sexual selection

aedeagus

Publication and Content Type

ref (subject category)

art (subject category)