1980] 
Hook & Matthews — Biology of Oxebelus 
29 
Figure 4. A pair of O. sericeus males grappling to determine territory ownership. 
struggling, while others more strongly resisted male advances. 
Resistance consisted of bending the gaster down and pygidium 
forwards, or dragging the mounted male and prey towards the 
entrance. Females appeared to initiate the termination of copulation 
by struggling, thereby inducing the male to dismount, although 
persistent males at times ignored such signals. 
Provisioning females mainly interacted with guarding males, but 
sometimes they were mounted by as many as four different males 
between the initial landing site and their burrow. Rarely a female 
dragged a mounted male and prey to the nest entrance, and squeezed 
past him into the burrow without permitting copulation. More 
commonly, male and prey were too cumbersome to transport 
(especially if over 50 cm from the nest); in this situation prey-laden 
females more readily submitted. 
