In nature, male and female interests over reproduction are usually in conflict. Females tend to invest more heavily in each offspring than do males. As a result, females must carefully choose the best father for their offspring while males may increase their reproductive success by inseminating many females. Conflicts over paternity become particularly intriguing when females mate multiply and the conflict must be resolved within the female reproductive tract.
In a group of spiders with diverse reproductive morphologies, this study will explore how behavior and reproductive tract morphology may bias paternity. Light and scanning electron microscopy will be used to accurately describe female reproductive morphology in four focal taxa. Behavioral analysis will be used to uncover how males and females may influence paternity by manipulating the timing, duration, and frequency of copulation, re-mating interval, oviposition timing, etc. Molecular markers will be used to assess paternity when females have been experimentally mated with multiple males.
These studies will shed light on the interplay between the constraints imposed by history and the adaptations that females and males may evolve. This is an area of growing interest in evolutionary biology.
