It is not uncommon to find courtship displays that incorporate numerous components across different sensory modalities. We studied displays in male jumping spiders of the genus Habronattus F.O. Pickard-Cambridge, 1901, which court females using a combination of ornament and motion (dance) displays coordinated with vibrational songs. To explore the diversity in Habronattus courtship complexity, we focused on quantifying the dance and vibratory displays in nine members of the Habronattus clypeatus species group, with preliminary observations on two additional species from this group. Additionally, we looked at display variation across populations in two widespread species from this group. We document three main courtship types: “stilting”, “buzzing”, and “spinning”, each identifiable by the presence or emphasis on particular display types. We found that for the widespread species H. clypeatus (Banks, 1895), different populations differed significantly and could be classified as either stilting or buzzing types. We discuss these results in relation to broader patterns of signal evolution and diversification in Habronattus.
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23 February 2021
Complex courtship in the Habronattus clypeatus group (Araneae: Salticidae)
Christine Rivera,
Marshal Hedin,
Andrew C. Mason,
Wayne P. Maddison,
Damian O. Elias
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The Journal of Arachnology
Vol. 48 • No. 3
December 2020
Vol. 48 • No. 3
December 2020
biotremology
Jumping spiders
multimodal signals
substrate-borne vibration
vibratory courtship