Maintenance of polymorphic females: do parasites play a role?

The role of parasites in explaining maintenance of polymorphism is an unexplored research avenue. In odonates, female-limited color polymorphism (one female morph mimicking the conspecific male and one or more gynochromatic morphs) is widespread. Here we investigated whether parasitism contributes to color polymorphism maintenance by studying six species of female dimorphic damselflies using large databases of field-collected animals. We...