"O que forma o melhor lutador? Entendendo as estratégias de avaliação durante interações agonísticas da libélula Perithemis tenera"

Abstract

Animal contest theory presumes that rivals can withdraw from a contest based on both individual and opponent fighting capacity and relative resource value. However, empirical studies often overlook the possibility that these three factors simultaneously contribute to individuals' decision to withdraw. At the same time, these contributions can vary between contest phases, highlighting the need for efficient identification of potential contest phases. In contests for mating territories among males of the amberwing dragonfly (Perithemis tenera), rivals perform a wide range of behaviors that may represent distinct contest phases. If this is true, each phase may have a different contribution of both individual and opponent fighting capacity and resource value. Therefore, to understand the contest dynamic between P. tenera males, we evaluated if contests are structured in distinct phases and which factors determine individuals' decision to withdraw. We first tested if there were behavioral subsets that were more likely to transit among themselves rather than with other behaviors. After that, we tested whether male decisions to withdraw are based on a combination of loser's total fat mass (a surrogate for self-fighting capacity), winner's total fat mass (a surrogate for opponent fighting capacity), and territory quality index (a surrogate for resource value) or exclusively on one of these factors. We found that the behaviors adopted by males of P. tenera during contests can transit in any direction, which indicates that contests occur in a single phase. In addition, winners total fat mass and territory quality index were unrelated to the overall contest duration. However, loser's total fat mass was positively related to the overall contest duration, supporting self-assessment strategy. While many empirical studies provide mixed or partial support for various assessment strategies during contests, our novel approach offers clear evidence that P. tenera males primarily use self-assessment in their decision to withdraw.