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Choice behaviour of Myrmica rubra workers between ant larvae and larvae of their Phengaris (Maculinea) nausithous nest parasites

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Abstract

Larvae of Phengaris (Maculinea) butterflies are adopted by Myrmica workers and are obligate myrmecophiles. Brood recognition by Myrmica rubra workers was tested for concolonial larvae (M. rubra) versus allocolonial larvae (M. rubra and P. nausithous) to assay the mimetic efficiency of P. nausithous. In addition, we tested M. rubra ant colonies from different populations with and without the presence of Phengaris, to test for potential local adaptation in adoption behaviour. We show that M. rubra can distinguish between nest-mate and foreign larvae as well as between P. nausithous and their own larvae. Workers from the allopatric population inspected and rejected more P. nausithous larvae than workers from the sympatric population. This might reflect a local host adaptation in which the social parasite more efficiently mimes its sympatric host ants than allopatric ones.

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Acknowledgments

This work was supported by HIGRADE scholarship (Bissinger and Kolditz, 2008) and by the CLIMIT project (Settele and Kühn, 2009; Thomas et al., 2009). We thank Jens Kipping (coordinator of the LIFE-project “Pleisse-Aue”) and NABU Sachsen for supporting our science and for the permission to study the Phengaris nausithous population of Altenburg; Sylvia Ritter, Martin Musche, Jonathan Kidner, Bertrand Fouks, Hans-Hinrich Kaatz and Stephan Wolf for their help in statistical analysis and manuscript revision; and all members of Molecular Ecology group of Halle University and the Department of Community Ecology of the UFZ for the stimulating and kind support. We also wish to thank David Nash and an anonymous reviewer for their very helpful comments.

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  1. Department of Molecular Ecology, Martin-Luther-Universität-Halle-Wittenberg, Hoher-Weg 4, 06099, Halle, Germany

    G. Solazzo & R. F. A. Moritz

  2. Department of Community Ecology, UFZ, Helmholtz Centre for Environmental Research, Theodor-Lieser-Strasse 4, 06120, Halle, Germany

    G. Solazzo & J. Settele

  3. Department of Zoology and Entomology, University of Pretoria, Pretoria, 0002, South Africa

    R. F. A. Moritz

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  1. G. Solazzo
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Correspondence to G. Solazzo.

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Solazzo, G., Moritz, R.F.A. & Settele, J. Choice behaviour of Myrmica rubra workers between ant larvae and larvae of their Phengaris (Maculinea) nausithous nest parasites. Insect. Soc. 60, 57–64 (2013). https://doi.org/10.1007/s00040-012-0265-3

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