Abstract

Sexual communication in animals often involves duetting characterized by a coordinated reciprocal exchange of acoustic signals. We used playback experiments to study the role of timing of a female reply in the species-specific duet structure in the leafhopper Aphrodes makarovi (Hemiptera: Cicadellidae). In leafhoppers, mate recognition and location is mediated exclusively by species- and sex-specific substrate-borne vibrational signals and a female signal emitted in reply to male advertisement calls is essential for recognition and successful location of the female. In A. makarovi, males have to initiate each exchange of vibrational signals between partners, and in a duet the beginning of a female reply overlaps the end of the male advertisement call. Results of playback treatments in which female replies were delayed and did not overlap with the male call revealed that in order to trigger an appropriate behavioural response of the male, female reply has to appear in a period less than 400 ms after the end of the initiating male call. Results also suggest that males are not able to detect a female reply while calling, since female reply that did not continue after the end of male call triggered male behaviour similar to behaviour observed in the absence of female reply. Together, our results show that vibrational duets are tightly coordinated and that the species-specific duet structure plays an important role in mate recognition in location processes.

Highlights

  • Communication enables sexual partners to recognize and find each other and is an essential part of reproductive behaviour [1]

  • Results of the present study show that in A. makarovi the timing of a female reply has profound effects on male signalling and searching behaviour and influenced the likelihood of finding the female

  • Our results indicate that in this species males are not able to detect female reply while calling; in order to trigger the appropriate mate searching behaviour female reply has to appear in the time window immediately after the end of male call

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Summary

Introduction

Communication enables sexual partners to recognize and find each other and is an essential part of reproductive behaviour [1]. Sexual communication based on acoustic signals often involves reciprocal exchange of signals between partners [2, 3]. The coordinated exchange of air-borne and substrate-borne acoustic signals is usually termed duetting and has been described in many arthropod and vertebrate taxa [2,3,4,5]. Duets are characterized by a predictable and stereotyped timing of signals and temporal coordination is expressed in reply latency, PLOS ONE | DOI:10.1371/journal.pone.0139020. Duets are characterized by a predictable and stereotyped timing of signals and temporal coordination is expressed in reply latency, PLOS ONE | DOI:10.1371/journal.pone.0139020 October 21, 2015

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