Sequential mate choice in decorated crickets: females use a fixed internal threshold in pre- and postcopulatory choice

In nature, female crickets often encounter males sequentially, choosing whether to mate with each male they find rather than selecting the most attractive male from a pool of available mates. Upon encountering a male, a female may base her decision to mate on a particular internal threshold or on a relative standard that takes into account the attractiveness of her previous mates. Here, we test whether the attractiveness of a female's previous mating partner influences her behaviour with respect to a second mate in the decorated cricket Gryllodes sigillatus. We measured both pre- and postcopulatory female mate choice as well as the effect that postcopulatory mating guarding by males had on females' postcopulatory behaviour. We showed that in both their first and second matings, pre- and postcopulatory mate choice are congruent, as females prefer to mate with, and accept more sperm from, attractive males. However, the outcome of pre- and postcopulatory choice does not depend on the attractiveness of a female's previous mate, suggesting that females employ a single standard upon which their mating decisions are based. (c) 2007 The Association for the Study of Animal Behaviour. Published by Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.