Intra-specific variation in female remating in Callosobruchus chinensis and C-maculatus

The effects of mating duration on female remating (exp. 1) and under different male densities (exp. 2) were examined in two strains of the adzuki bean beetle, Callosobruchus chinensis and in one strain of the bruchid beetle, C maculatus. In experiment 1, the frequency of female remating was markedly different between the two strains of C chinensis. Females of the jC strain, reared long-term in the laboratory, did not remate after being allowed to mate freely (=monogamy), whereas females of the isC strain, recently established from the field, showed high remating frequencies (=polyandry). In both strains, the frequency of female remating increased after the duration of the first mating was deliberately shortened. The relation between mating duration and remating frequency was significantly different, however, between the two strains. In a closely related species, C maculatus, which manifests polyandry, this relation was more similar to that of the field-derived (=isC) than to that of the laboratory-derived (=jC) strain of C chinensis. The reasons for the inter-strain variation observed in the remating frequencies of C chinensis are also discussed. In experiment 2, the mating duration of the three strains was compared under different male densities. Only the lab-derived strain demonstrated a significantly shorter mating duration when one female was placed together with five males than when paired with one male. The shorter mating duration (approximately 26 s) was similar to that of females allowed to remate in the monogamous strain in experiment 1. (C) 2004 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.