The Role of Olfaction in Courtship Behavior of the American Lobster Homarus americanus.

Courtship behavior is well documented in captive lobsters. Sex pheromones contained in female urine and perceived by receptors on male antennules are thought to act as sex attractants or as signals necessary for pair formation. In this study, the lateral and medial antennules of male and female lobsters were removed. The result of these excisions were meant to indicate the gender-specific role of olfactory chemoreception in lobster courtship behavior. Removal of male antennules had little effect on pair bonding and mating. In contrast, removal of female antennules resulted in dramatic aberrations in behavior, including postmolt injuries and, in extreme cases, unsuccessful couplings and mortality. Therefore, female olfaction plays the more critical role in the normal reproductive behavior of Homarus americanus.

• Publication year

  1991

• Venue

  The Biological Bulletin

• Publication date

  1991-12-01

• Fields of study

  Biology, Medicine

• Identifiers
  DOI 10.2307/1542360PMID 29304678
• External record

  Open on Semantic Scholar

• Source metadata

  Semantic Scholar, PubMed

• No claims are published for this paper.

• No concepts are published for this paper.

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