Growth or reproduction: Intrasexual competition in a colonial damselfishStegastes nigricans

Intrasexual competition within colonies of the damselfishStegastes nigricans was investigated. Both males and females held individual territories, and these territories were adjacently distributed, forming distinct conspecific colonies with different size compositions. In both large and small colonies, only relatively large individuals participated in reproduction. Breeding males and females left their territories to court, spawn and aggregate more frequently than non-breeders of the same colonies. Breeders were less frequently attacked by other fish during these excursions than were non-breeders. Most attacks were conducted by breeders of the same sex. This intrasexual aggression may suppress the reproduction of non-breeders at least in large colonies. Non-breeders in large colonies had smaller gonads than breeders of both large and small colonies, but they grew faster than breeders of the same body size in small colonies. This suggests that non-breeders in large colonies allocate energy to growth in order to be reproductively competitive in the future, although only a few of them remained in the same colonies upon maturity. Colony size thus has an effect on the reproductive life histories of individual damselfish.