Courtship in the monogamous convict cichlid; what are individuals saying to rejected and selected mates?

I examined the relation between courtship and mate choice in convict cichlids by presenting females with the option of courting and spawning with one of two males that were isolated from each other. I quantified the amount of courtship performed by females towards males they selected as mates and males they rejected, and the amount of courtship performed by each male towards the female. I measured courtship using two rates: (1) daily courtship rate, the total number of courtship events per number of days until spawning; and (2) contact courtship rate, the total number of courtship events per day per total time spent with a given individual. Females showed similar contact courtship rates to each male, whereas both types of courtship rates between females and only rejected males were significantly and positively correlated. Females showed a nonsignificant tendency to select larger males. Females spent significantly more time with the males they selected and therefore females' daily courtship rate towards selected males was significantly higher than that towards rejected males. Although females showed a preference early in their search for the male they eventually selected, they continued to spend time with, and court, the rejected male until spawning with the selected male, indicating that females continuously assess males throughout their search. Male courtship differed from female courtship in that while the daily courtship rates towards, the females did not differ significantly between males, the contact courtship rate of rejected males was significantly higher than that of selected males. Thus, rejected males may court more because they know they are not the preferred male, or selected males may court less because they know they are the preferred male, or a combination of both. (C) 2004 The Association for the Study of Animal Behaviour. Published by Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.