Sperm performance can vary in ecologically divergent populations, but it is often not clear whether the environment per se or genomic differences arising from divergent selection cause the difference. One powerful and easily manipulated environmental effect is diet. Populations of bedbugs (Cimex lectularius) naturally feed either on bat or human blood. These are diverging genetically into a bat-associated and a human-associated lineage. To measure how male diet affects sperm performance, we kept males of two HL and BL populations each on either their own or the foreign diet. Then we investigated male reproductive success in a single mating and sperm competition context. We found that male diet affected female fecundity and changed the outcome of sperm competition, at least in the human lineage. However, this influence of diet on sperm performance was moulded by an interaction. Bat blood generally had a beneficial effect on sperm competitiveness and seemed to be a better food source in both lineages. Few studies have examined the effects of male diet on sperm performance generally, and sperm competition specifically. Our results reinforce the importance to consider the environment in which sperm are produced. In the absence of gene flow, such differences may increase reproductive isolation. In the presence of gene flow, however, the generally better sperm performance after consuming bat blood suggests that the diet is likely to homogenise rather than isolate populations.

Animal Population Ecology Animal Ecology 1 University of Bayreuth Universitätsstrasse 30 95440 Bayreuth Germany

Applied Zoology Department of Biology Technische Universität Dresden 01062 Dresden Germany

Department of Botany and Zoology Faculty of Science Masaryk University Kotlářská 2 611 37 Brno Czech Republic

Department of Ecology Faculty of Environmental Sciences Czech University of Life Sciences Prague Kamýcká 129 165 21 Prague 6 Czech Republic

Genomics and Bioinformatics Bayreuth Center of Ecology and Environmental Research University of Bayreuth Universitätsstrasse 30 95440 Bayreuth Germany

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Despite genetic isolation in sympatry, post-copulatory reproductive barriers have not evolved between bat- and human-associated common bedbugs (Cimex lectularius L.)

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