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Social insects

Facultative worker policing in a wasp

Nature volume 407, pages 692–693 (2000)Cite this article

Abstract

Kin-selection theory predicts that in social-insect colonies where the queen has mated multiple times, the workers will enforce cooperation by policing each other's reproduction1,2,3,4. We have discovered a species, the wasp Dolichovespula saxonica, in which some queens mate once and others mate many times, and in which workers frequently attempt reproduction, allowing this prediction to be tested directly. We find that multiple mating by the queen leads to mutual policing by workers, whereas single mating does not.

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Figure 1: Figure 1 Worker egg-laying in Dolichovespula saxonica.
Figure 2: Pedigree relatedness among workers versus adult male production by workers in nine colonies of the wasp Dolichovespula saxonica (green circles).

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Animal and Plant Sciences, Laboratory of Apiculture and Social Insects, Sheffield University, Western Bank, Sheffield, S10 2TN, UK

    Kevin R. Foster & Francis L. W. Ratnieks

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  1. Kevin R. Foster
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  2. Francis L. W. Ratnieks
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Correspondence to Kevin R. Foster.

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Foster, K., Ratnieks, F. Facultative worker policing in a wasp. Nature 407, 692–693 (2000). https://doi.org/10.1038/35037665

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