Early in the cool morning, males warm on the sand below the aerial swarm, and when a sufficient body temperature is achieved for strenuous hovering flight and chases, the male returns to the swarm. The air circulation generated by the rapidly beating wings cools the male, more rapidly in the cooler morning temperatures than later in mid-morning. By 11 am, temperatures have risen sufficiently to allow males to remain continuously in the air. At this time, all males present at a lek site are engaged in territorial activity, i.e., frequent attacks and chases in the swarm, perhaps as males vie for some sort of optimal position in the swarm. Not surprisingly, females ready to mate arrive at the lek sites then, with the majority of copulations occurring in the half hour around 11 am.
Females mate only once, as soon as they emerge.
Males burn themselves out quickly from the exertion of fighting in the aerial swarm. Females spend the rest of their adult lives feeding on nectar and pollen and basking on the sand in the cool mornings and late afternoons. Apparently they are developing the large eggs that each hatch into a large, vigorous planidium larvae, which then burrows actively in the sand until it finds a host. Lek sites are on average 120 m apart, and the landing diameter of each lek site is an average of 15 m. Most lek sites have not moved positions in the nearly 20 years that we have been censusing them, with one interesting exception of a lek located on top of a dune ridge.