Bodybuilding Dragonflies: Costs and Benefits of Maximizing Flight Muscle

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Abstract
The relationship between flight-muscle ratio (FMR; flight-muscle mass/body mass) and aerial competitive ability was studied in Plathemis lydia dragonflies. These dragonflies approximately double their body mass during adult maturation. This is due primarily to growth of flight muscle in males and growth of ovaries in females. Males attain one of the highest FMRs of any animal; up to 60% of their body mass is flight muscle. During observations of relative mating success among groups of two to five individually marked males, there was a significant decline in mating success with decreasing FMR rank. Relative mating success was measured by the proportion of total daily oviposition time spent by females mated last by each male. Males that had their FMRs reduced experimentally by attachment of small weights had poor territorial and mating success when they were competing with unweighted males. These results suggest that a high FMR enhances ability to compete in aerial contests, which enables greater short-term mating success. Mature males with the highest FMRs had the least gut contents and fat reserves; thus, there is a trade-off made between flight ability and nutritional state that may affect longevity and long-term mating success. A trade-off between benefits derived from enhanced flight performance and costs incurred by reducing the mass of tissues other than flight muscle is probably widespread among flying animals.

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