Abstract
We tried to elucidate how females of a paternal nest brooding goby Rhinogohius sp. OR deposit their eggs in a nest, using a marking technique for live eggs under laboratory conditions in which male somatic condition, nest space, and mating pattern (monogamous or bigamous) were controlled. Whether females rejected mating was independent of either male quality, such as body size and somatic condition, or nest space. In a situation in which two females were allowed to spawn sequentially with a male, however, females rejected mating at a higher rate when they were the first to spawn than when they were the second to spawn; this is because eggs from first females were more vulnerable to cannibalism by parental males and second females. Even when nest space was limited and thus was occupied by eggs from the first females, second females could deposit all their eggs in the nest by using the minute interspace of existing eggs. In the presence of the parental male, such a female seemed less likely to suffer a cost from increased egg mortality due to crowdedness, still holding the advantage of being the second spawner. Finally, we extrapolated the field breeding ecology of this fish from the laboratory data. It was suggested that a single monolayer brood of the same age usually consisted of eggs from multiple females and thus the mating pattern would be more polygynous than previously expected.
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Received: March 6, 2002 / Revised: July 11, 2002 / Accepted: August 14, 2002
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ID="*" Present address: Center for Marine Environmental Studies, Ehime University, 3 Bunkyo-cho, Matsuyama 790-8577, Japan (e-mail: nokuda@sci.ehime-u.ac.jp)
Acknowledgments I am grateful to S. Sone and D. Takahashi for giving us useful information and to M. Inoue and H. Miyatake for their field assistance. This study was financially supported by Research Fellowships of the Japan Society for the Promotion of Science for Young Scientists.
Correspondence to:Noboru Okuda
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Okuda, N., Ito, S. & Iwao, H. Female spawning strategy in Rhinogobius sp. OR: how do females deposit their eggs in the nest?. Ichthyol Res 49, 371–379 (2002). https://doi.org/10.1007/s102280200056
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s102280200056