Abstract
The parasitoid beetle Metoecus paradoxus frequently parasitizes colonies of the common wasp, Vespula vulgaris. It penetrates a host colony as a larva that attaches itself onto a foraging wasp’s body and, once inside the nest, it feeds on a wasp larva inside a brood cell and then pupates. Avoiding detection by the wasp host is crucial when the beetle emerges. Here, we tested whether adult M. paradoxus beetles avoid detection by mimicking the cuticular hydrocarbon profile of their host. The beetles appear to be chemically adapted to their main host species, the common wasp, because they share more hydrocarbon compounds with it than they do with the related German wasp, V. germanica. In addition, aggression tests showed that adult beetles were attacked less by common wasp workers than by German wasp workers. Our results further indicated that the host-specific compounds were, at least partially, produced through recycling of the prey’s hydrocarbons, and were not acquired through contact with the adult host. Moreover, the chemical profile of the beetles shows overproduction of the wasp queen pheromone, nonacosane (n-C29), suggesting that beetles might mimic the queen’s pheromonal bouquet.
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Acknowledgments
AVO, HH, and TW were supported by Research Foundation Flanders (FWO) and the KU Leuven Centre of Excellence PF/2010/007, JSvZ was supported by a postdoctoral fellowship of FWO (grant 12Q7615N).
Author Contributions
AVO, HH, WB and TW designed the experiments. AVO and HH collected wasp nests and carried out experiments. AVO, JSvZ, HH and FD analyzed the data. AVO, JSvZ, and TW wrote the manuscript.
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Annette Van Oystaeyen and Jelle S. van Zweden contributed equally to this work.
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Van Oystaeyen, A., van Zweden, J.S., Huyghe, H. et al. Chemical Strategies of the Beetle Metoecus Paradoxus, Social Parasite of the Wasp Vespula Vulgaris . J Chem Ecol 41, 1137–1147 (2015). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10886-015-0652-0
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10886-015-0652-0