No geographical differences in male mate choice in a widespread fish, Limia perugiae

Behavior, like most other traits, can have a spatial component, and variability of behavior at the population level is predicted. In the present paper, we explore male mate choice at this level. Male mate choice, while maybe not as common as female choice, is expected to evolve when males respond to significant variation in female quality and, for example, prefer females with higher fecundity. In fishes, higher fecundity is associated with larger body size, an easily measured trait. In the present study, we investigated the presence of male mate choice for larger females in a widespread species of livebearing fish, Limia perugiae, while comparing preferences between populations. We hypothesized that environmental variation, for example in the form of salinity, might result in population differences. Using dichotomous choice tests, we analyzed behavioral data for 80 individuals from seven distinct populations from Hispaniola. We found that L. perugiae males significantly preferred large ..., We collected preference data using binary choice tests. Raw data was collected by a human observer using stopwatches., , # No geographical differences in male mate choice in a widespread fish, Limia perugiae

We tested a widespread species of Livebearing fish from the Dominican Republic, Limia perugiae for male preferences for larger female body size. We found that males indeed prefer larger females. However, there were no differences between the populations we used, although the populations differed in environmental variables, such as salinity.

## Description of the data and file structure

Our data is raw data reporting typical data from binary choice tests. There are four data sheets in the Excel file. The first column of sheet 1, “Experiment” provides a unique identifier for each male used. The second column “Fish” provides the order in which males were tested. The file is sorted by population, consequently the order seems random. The third column refers to the population of males used. See main text and sheet 2 for population info, but note that alb refers to the Gold variant, gh46 to Balneario La...