Mate Choice versus Mate Preference: Inferences about Color-Assortative Mating Differ between Field and Lab Assays of Poison Frog Behavior

Codivergence of mating traits and mate preferences can lead to behavioral isolation among lineages in early stages of speciation. However, mate preferences limit gene flow only when expressed as mate choice, and numerous factors might be more important than preferences in nature. In the extremely color polytypic strawberry poison frog (Oophaga pumilio), female mate preferences have codiverged with color in most allopatric populations tested. Whether these lab-assayed preferences predict mating (gene flow) in the wild remains unclear. We observed courting pairs in a natural contact zone between red and blue lineages until oviposition or courtship termination. We found color-assortative mating in a disturbed habitat with high population density but not in a secondary forest with lower density. Our results suggest color-assortative O. pumilio mate choice in the wild but also mating patterns that do not match those predicted by lab-assayed preferences.

• Publication year

  2019

• Venue

  American Naturalist

• Publication date

  2019-02-15

• Fields of study

  Biology, Medicine, Environmental Science

• Identifiers
  DOI 10.1086/702249PMID 30912970
• 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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