Abstract
In polymorphic male painted dragon lizards ( Ctenophorus pictus ), red males win staged contests for females over yellow males, and yellow males have greater success in staged sperm competition trials than red males. This predicts different reproductive strategies in the wild with red males being more coercive or better mate guarders than yellow males. Yellow males would be expected to sire more offspring per copulation and have a greater proportion of offspring from clutches with mixed paternity. However, here we show using microsatellites that the frequency of mixed paternity in the wild is low (