Data from: Sexual selection reinforces a higher flight endurance in urban damselflies

Urbanisation is among the most important and globally rapidly increasing
anthropogenic processes, and is known to drive rapid evolution. Habitats
in urbanised areas typically consist of small, fragmented and isolated
patches, which is expected to select for a better locomotor performance,
along with its underlying morphological traits. This, in turn, is expected
to cause differentiation in selection regimes, as populations with
different frequency distributions for a given trait will span different
parts of the species’ fitness function. Yet, very few studies considered
differentiation in phenotypic traits associated with patterns in habitat
fragmentation and isolation along urbanisation gradients, and none
considered differentiation in sexual selection regimes. We investigated
differentiation in flight performance and flight-related traits, and
sexual selection on these traits across replicated urban and rural
populations of the scrambling damselfly Coenagrion puella. To disentangle
direct and indirect paths going from phenotypic traits over performance to
mating success, we applied a path analysis approach. We report for the
first time direct evidence for the expected better locomotor performance
in urban compared to rural populations. This matches a scenario of spatial
sorting, whereby only the individuals with the best locomotor abilities
colonise the isolated urban populations. The covariation patterns and
causal relationships among the phenotypic traits, performance and mating
success strongly depended on the urbanisation level. Notably, we detected
sexual selection for a higher flight endurance only in urban populations,
indicating that the higher flight performance of urban males was
reinforced by sexual selection. Taken together, our results provide a
unique proof of the interplay between sexual selection and adaptation to
human-altered environments.