Intrinsic Factors Affecting Female Choice in House Crickets: Time Cost, Female Age, Nutritional Condition, Body Size, and Size-Relative Reproductive Investment

Few studies have examined potential costs of female choice and factors intrinsic to females that affect choice. To examine these factors, female house crickets, Acheta domesticus, were presented with a simultaneous choice between tapes of a priori attractive and unattractive male chirps. Females varied in age, nutritional condition, body size (potential fecundity), and size-relative reproductive investment. Female age had a significant effect on female choosiness: young females were selective, whereas older females were not selective. Nutritional condition, body size, and size-relative reproductive investment did not affect female choice. Females that chose the call of the attractive male spent approximately twice as long choosing as females that chose the unattractive male call.

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