Sex Role Reversal in Pipefish

Abstract

Publisher Summary The chapter presents the problem in two sex role-reversed pipefish species. The chapter discusses why potential reproductive rates differ and the consequences of this “reversed” mating competition on sexually selected traits in females. Potential reproductive rates—that is, how fast males and females can potentially remate, given that partner availability is not limiting, and operational sex ratios, that is, the proportion of males and females willing to mate are instrumental in understanding this pattern. In two sex role-reversed pipefish species, Syngnathus typhle and Nerophis ophidion, males devoted more time, but not more energy, than females to offspring production. The chapter outlines the costs and benefits of these sexually selected traits and mating preferences to allow for a better understanding of sexual selection processes in sex role-reversed species and understands the very same processes in species with conventional sex roles. The chapter explains that sex role reversal and female ornamentation seem intimately linked with paternal care and how that paternal care may have evolved in syngnathids and how sex role reversal in pipefish is ultimately a consequence of an extreme level of paternal care in combination with a polygamous mating pattern are discussed.