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Mate Choice In Lekking Sage Grouse Revisited: The Roles Of Vocal Display, Female Site Fidelity, And Copying, Robert M. Gibson, Jack W. Bradbury, Sandra L. Vehrencamp

School of Biological Sciences: Faculty Publications

In lekking sage grouse (Centrocercus urophasianus), females exhibit relatively unanimous mate choice for particular males, but a satisfactory explanation for this unanimity has been elusive. We present analyses of mating distributions from two leks over 4 years that provide evidence for female choice based on differences in vocal display performance of males, the locations at which hens mated in the previous year, and the choices of other females (copying). The unanimity of female choice varied markedly among leks and years in correlation with changes in the mean numbers of hens that mated at the same time and hence …