ABSTRACT
This paper is the first to integrate both field and theoretical approaches to demonstrate that fertility benefits can be a direct benefit to females mating on the classical lek. Field data collected for male sharp-tailed grouse (Tympanuchus phasianellus), a classical lekking species, revealed potential fertility benefits for selective females. Adult males and individuals occupying centrally located territories on the lek were found to have significantly larger testes than juveniles and peripheral individuals. Further, using empirical data from previously published studies of classical lekking grouse species, time-series analysis was employed to illustrate that female mating patterns, seasonal and daily, were non-random. We are the first to show that these patterns coincide with times when male fertility is at its peak.
Subject(s)
Birds , Sexual Behavior, Animal , Animals , Female , Male , Periodicity , SeasonsABSTRACT
We consider an evolutionary game model in which strategies are transmitted culturally from parents to offspring rather than inherited biologically. Our analysis yields two noteworthy results. First, biocultural games show a greater diversity of dynamical behaviors than their purely biological counterparts, including multiple fully polymorphic equilibria. Second, biocultural games on average exhibit greater equilibrium strategy diversity because of the countervailing influences of cultural transmission and natural selection. Therefore, knowledge of a strategy's influence on Darwinian fitness is not sufficient to infer the evolutionary consequences of biocultural games. Further, our results suggest that cultural transmission in the presence of natural selection may be an important mechanism maintaining behavioral diversity in natural populations.
