Department of Integrative Biology

Courtship pheromones play an important role in salamander reproductive behaviour. In salamanders of the family Plethodontidae, males deliver specialized pheromones to females during courtship interactions. These courtship pheromones increase female receptivity and may be involved in mate discrimination. In order to test hypotheses related to mate discrimination, we staged courtship encounters between male-female Plethodon shermani pairs in which the female received pheromones obtained from either conspecific (P. shermani) or heterospecific (P. yonahlossee or P. montanus) males. Both conspecific and heterospecific pheromones increased female receptivity. Moreover, pheromones from both heterospecific species were as effective as the conspecific pheromone in increasing female receptivity in P. shermani females. Our results suggest that the courtship pheromone signal and function may be conserved across related species, with mate discrimination occurring before pheromone delivery. (C) 2003 The Association for the Study of Animal Behaviour. Published by Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.