Looking for a mate? Oh, whatever
By Susan Milius
From Atlanta, Ga., at the annual meeting of the Animal Behavior Society
Two ground cricket species seem rather casual about telling themselves apart, and biologists are wondering why.
The two crickets, Allonemobius fasciatus and Allonemobius socius, can produce hybrids, reports James H. Benedix of DePauw University in Greencastle, Ind. Yet the hybrids don’t thrive.
In theory, such results of interspecies romance could lead the two species to develop exaggerated differences where their ranges overlap. Such exaggerations, called reproductive-character displacements, help delineate species.