In polymorphic male painted dragon lizards (Ctenophorus pictus), red males win staged contests for females over yellow males, and yellow males have greater success in staged sperm competition trials than red males. This predicts different reproductive strategies in the wild with red males being more coercive or better mate guarders than yellow males. Yellow males would be expected to sire more offspring per copulation and have a greater proportion of offspring from clutches with mixed paternity. However, here we show using microsatellites that the frequency of mixed paternity in the wild is low (< 20% on average across years), that all morphs on average have the same number of offspring sired per year, and that mating system variation (polyandry vs. monandry) is strongly correlated with perch density on male territories. Furthermore, a logistic regression on male successful vs. unsuccessful mate acquisition showed that red males were under negative selection when they dominated the population, which suggests ongoing frequency dependent selection on male colouration. © 2007 The Authors.

Item Type:	Refereed Article
Research Division:	Biological Sciences
Research Group:	Ecology
Research Field:	Behavioural Ecology
Objective Division:	Expanding Knowledge
Objective Group:	Expanding Knowledge
Objective Field:	Expanding Knowledge in the Environmental Sciences
Author:	Wapstra, E (Associate Professor Erik Wapstra)
ID Code:	49767
Year Published:	2007
Web of Science® Times Cited:	33
Deposited By:	Zoology
Deposited On:	2007-08-01
Last Modified:	2009-08-20
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