Colony Kin Relatedness and Male Production in Dolichovespula Arenaria
Abstract
The number of times a female social insect mates has important implications for the evolution and maintenance of sociality. My study focuses on queen mating frequency in a social wasp, Dolichovespula arenaria (Order: Hymenoptera, Family: Vespidae, Subfamily: Vespinae). Queen mating frequencies are known for only a few species of vespine wasps; adding data for additional species will help to establish trends in social evolution within this clade. Colonies of D. arenaria were collected in the subalpine zone of the Front Range of the Colorado Rocky Mountains in 2002 and 2003. Worker, queen, and male genotypes were analyzed using three DNA microsatellite loci Rufa 5, 13 and 15 (Thoren et at. 1995, Foster et at. 2001). Worker relatedness ranged from 0.57 to 0.83 within each of the seven colonies sampled with a mean relatedness of 0.77. Five of the seven colonies supported the hypothesis of single mating by queens. In one colony two and in one colony three matings were likely. Effective paternity in these two colonies was 1.48 and 1.91, respectively. Four colonies sampled contained males that were assigned as worker or queen progeny using both the exclusion and maximum likelihood methods; each method yielded similar results. In two of these colonies, all males were likely progeny of the queen. In the other two colonies worker produced 8 to 24% of the males. Overall 91.5% of the males in the population were likely progeny of the queen. These patterns are consistent with published studies of vespine wasps.
Document Details
- Document Type
- Technical Report
- Publication Date
- Jan 01, 2003
- Accession Number
- ADA427618
Entities
People
- Brian J. Freiburger
Organizations
- Air Force Institute of Technology