Md. Jennions et al., REPEATABILITY OF MATE CHOICE - THE EFFECT OF SIZE IN THE AFRICAN PAINTED REED FROG, HYPEROLIUS-MARMORATUS, Animal behaviour, 49(1), 1995, pp. 181-186
Female painted reed frogs were offered a choice between artificial adv
ertisement calls differing in frequency. Repeatability of mate choice
was assessed by multiple testing of females. When the difference betwe
en the stimuli was 400 Hz, almost all females, regardless of size, con
sistently chose the low frequency call. When the frequency difference
between the calls was smaller (200 Hz), females as a group appeared to
choose at random. However, individual females seemed to show repeatab
ility of mate choice. There was also a relationship between female siz
e and the number of times they chose the lower frequency stimuli. This
suggests that the manner in which females respond to stimuli that dif
fer in frequency may be size-dependent. Larger females may be more sen
sitive to variation in call frequency, and therefore more likely to ex
press a mating preference for low frequency calls.