Traumatic mating in a wolf spider

Strict monandry is rare in animals in nature. Though traumatic mating has
been reported to postpone female re-mating, it rarely leads to strict
monandry. We demonstrate that traumatic mating causes strict monandry in a
wandering wolf spider, Pardosa pseudoannulata. We show direct evidence
that males damaged the inner walls of female genital tracts with the sharp
embolus on their palps during insemination. To confirm that the trauma
reduced female willingness to re-mate, we mimicked male palp insertions by
micro-injecting seminal fluids and/or causing trauma to female genital
tracts, then we let the manipulated females mate. Result of mating trials
showed that seminal fluids indeed have, but not significant impact in
inhibiting female mating. However, once female genital tracts were
wounded, female’s mating willingness were greatly suppressed. In addition,
we found that wounds caused by male traumatic matings lead to hemorrhages,
which gradually turn into impermeable amorphous mating plugs. The mating
plugs gradually blocked female genital tracts, and finally completely
preventing females from re-mating. We thus provide evidence for strict
monandry in P. pseudoannulata due to male traumatic mating through two
means: genital trauma suppressed female’s re-mating willingness and mating
plugs completely prevented females from re-mating.