The importance of breeding vocalizations for mate attraction in a freshwater goby with a composite sound repertoire

Male gobies, Padogobius martensii, emit 'tonal' sounds during courtship, and 'drumming' and 'complex' sounds during spawning. The complex sound is a two-part vocalization consisting of a drumming sound followed without pause by a tonal sound. In the laboratory, the playback of both the tonal sound and the drumming sound to ripe females P. martensii determined oriented approaching and increased the time spent by the subject within the loudspeaker area. Response levels to the sound playback (drumming sounds) tended to be correlated with degree of ripeness of the female. Functional aspects of the female response to both types of acoustic stimuli are discussed.