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The Effect of Queen and Worker Adoption on Weaver Ant (Oecophylla smaragdina F.) Queen Fecundity

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Abstract

Incipient ant colonies are often under fierce competition, making fast growth crucial for survival. To increase production, colonies can adopt multiple queens (pleometrosis), fuse with other colonies or rob brood from neighboring colonies. However, different adoption strategies might have different impacts such as future queen fecundity or future colony size. O. smaragdina queen production was measured in incipient colonies with 2, 3 or 4 founding queens, following the transplantation of 0, 30 or 60 pupae from a donor colony. Pupae developed into mature workers, resulting in increased worker/queen ratios in pupae transplanted treatments and leading to increases in the per capita queen production. Conversely, more queens did not induce increased per capita fecundity. Thus, brood robbing added individuals to the worker force and increased future production of resident queens, whereas queen adoption increased the colony’s future production, but not the production of individual queens.

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Acknowledgements

This study was funded by The Carlsberg Foundation (2009-01-0406) and strongly supported by Professor Keith Christian and Charles Darwin University who provided the necessary facilities.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Bioscience, Aarhus University, DK-8600, Silkeborg, Denmark

    Joachim Offenberg

  2. Research Institute for the Environment and Livelihoods, Charles Darwin University, Darwin, NT, 0909, Australia

    Renkang Peng

  3. Department of Bioscience, Aarhus University, 8000, Aarhus C, Denmark

    Mogens Gissel Nielsen

  4. Australian Aboriginal Art and Culture, 8270, Højbjerg, Denmark

    Dorte Birkmose

Authors
  1. Joachim Offenberg
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  2. Renkang Peng
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  3. Mogens Gissel Nielsen
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  4. Dorte Birkmose
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Correspondence to Joachim Offenberg.

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Offenberg, J., Peng, R., Nielsen, M.G. et al. The Effect of Queen and Worker Adoption on Weaver Ant (Oecophylla smaragdina F.) Queen Fecundity. J Insect Behav 25, 478–485 (2012). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10905-011-9311-7

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10905-011-9311-7

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