Reproductive biology of Hawaiian lava crickets

Insects have spread across diverse ecological niches, including extreme environments requiring specialized traits for survival. However, little is understood about the reproductive traits required to facilitate persistence in such environments. Here, we report on the reproductive biology of two species of endemic Hawaiian lava crickets (Caconemobius fori and Caconemobius anahulu) that inhabit barren lava flows on the Big Island. We examine traits that reflect investment into reproduction for both male and female lava crickets and compare them to the non-extremophile Allard’s ground cricket (Allonemobius allardi) in the same sub-family. Lava cricket females possessed fewer, but much larger eggs than ground crickets, while males do not provide the costly nuptial gifts that are characteristic of the Nemobiinae subfamily. Lava crickets also have longer ovipositors relative to their body length than related Caconemobius species that occupy cave habitats on the Hawaiian islands. The differenc..., , , # Lava Cricket Reproduction

[https://doi.org/10.5061/dryad.c2fqz61h2](https://doi.org/10.5061/dryad.c2fqz61h2)

## Description of the data and file structure

There are 3 .csv files with data from this work. Each line represents a single individual. The data contains measurements of pronotum length, ovipositor lengths, egg number, and egg sizes for female lava crickets (*Caconemobius fori*, *Caconemobius anahulu*) and Allard’s ground crickets (*Allonemobius allardi*). It also has data on the presence or absence of the specialized tibial spur on male and female crickets of the above species. Each line represents a single individual. 'NA' in each sheet represents the absence of relevant data for that cell. Statistical analysis and graphing to produce results and figures in the paper were obtained by running the script in the file \"lava_cricket_dataanalysis.R.\"

## File titled \"spur_lava_cricket_data.csv\":

### Variables:

* SampleNumber - identifying number where the letters represent sp...,