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Assortative mating is of interest because of its role in speciation and the maintenance of species boundaries. However, we know little about how within-species assortment is related to interspecific sexual isolation. Most previous studies of assortative mating have focused on a single trait in males and females, rather than utilizing multivariate trait information. Here, we investigate how intraspecific assortative mating relates to sexual isolation in two sympatric and congeneric damselfly species (genus Calopteryx). We connect intraspecific assortment to interspecific sexual isolation by combining field observations, mate preference experiments, and enforced copulation experiments. Using canonical correlation analysis, we demonstrate multivariate intraspecific assortment for body size and body shape. Males of the smaller species mate more frequently with heterospecific females than males of the larger species, which showed less attraction to small heterospecific females. Field experiments suggest that sexual isolation asymmetry is caused by male preferences for large heterospecific females, rather than by mechanical isolation due to interspecific size differences or female preferences for large males. Male preferences for large females and male-male competition for high quality females can therefore counteract sexual isolation. This sexual isolation asymmetry indicates that sexual selection currently opposes a species boundary. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background: Postzygotic isolation in the form of reduced viability and/or fertility of hybrids may help maintain species boundaries in the face of interspecific gene flow. Past hybridization events between house sparrows (Passer domesticus) and Spanish sparrows (P. hispaniolensis) have given rise to a homoploid hybrid species, the Italian sparrow (P. italiae). Although genetic incompatibilities are known to isolate these three species, the biological consequences of these incompatibilities are still unknown in early generation hybrids. Methods: We investigated whether F1 hybrids between house and Spanish sparrows experience reduced viability or fertility. More specifically, we generated hybrids through controlled crosses in aviaries, and compared ovaries of female hybrids with female of pure-species sparrows. Results: We found that overall, hybrid ovaries were underdeveloped and that half of all female hybrids exhibited symptoms of ovarian hypofunction (ovarian atrophy and complete absence of developed follicles). Conclusions: Fertility in hybrids is a common consequence or post-zygotic barriers between species. We discuss these results in light of previous findings on genetic incompatibilities between the parent species and the potential role of incompatibilities in hybrid speciation, a rare evolutionary process in birds. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Learning and other forms of phenotypic plasticity have been suggested to enhance population divergence. Mate preferences can develop by learning, and species recognition might not be entirely genetic. We present data on female mate preferences of the banded demoiselle ( Calopteryx splendens) that suggest a role for learning in population divergence and species recognition. Populations of this species are either allopatric or sympatric with a phenotypically similar congener ( C. virgo). These two species differ mainly in the amount of wing melanization in males, and wing patches thus mediate sexual isolation. In sympatry, sexually experienced females discriminate against large melanin wing patches in heterospecific males. In contrast, in allopatric populations within the same geographic region, females show positive ('open-ended') preferences for such large wing patches. Virgin C. splendens females do not discriminate against heterospecific males. Moreover, physical exposure experiments of such virgin females to con- or hetero-specific males significantly influences their subsequent mate preferences. Species recognition is thus not entirely genetic and it is partly influenced by interactions with mates. Learning causes pronounced population divergence in mate preferences between these weakly genetically differentiated populations, and results in a highly divergent pattern of species recognition at a small geographic scale. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]