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Hydrocarbon Signatures of Egg Maternity, Caste Membership and Reproductive Status in the Common Wasp

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Abstract

In most ants, bees, and wasps, the workers are capable of challenging the reproductive monopoly of the queen by laying unfertilized, male eggs. An important mechanism that can resolve this conflict is policing, whereby the queen or workers prevent successful worker reproduction by selectively eating worker-laid eggs or by attacking egg-laying workers. Egg policing by workers has been shown to occur in several social wasp species, but the information used by worker wasps to discriminate between queen-laid and worker-laid eggs has never been investigated. Our aim, therefore, was to investigate if hydrocarbons might be used in egg policing by workers in the common wasp, Vespula vulgaris, where worker policing previously has been shown to be effective. Our results show that 51 different hydrocarbons are present on the surface of newly-laid eggs, and that there are pronounced quantitative differences in the hydrocarbon profiles of queen-laid and worker-laid eggs, with longer-chained alkenes and methylated alkanes (C28–C31) in particular being more abundant on the surface of queen-laid eggs. We further show that the hydrocarbon profiles on the surface of queen-laid and worker-laid eggs resemble those found on the mother queen’s and workers’ cuticles. Interestingly, longer-chained methylated alkanes also were more abundant on the cuticle of both mother queens and reproductive workers, suggesting that these compounds are linked to fertility, as has also been found to be the case in several ant species.

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Acknowledgments

We thank the Institute for the Promotion of Innovation through Science and Technology in Flanders (IWT-Vlaanderen), and the Research Foundation Flanders (grant no. GNM-B5996-KAN2006) for funding. Patrizia d’Ettorre was supported by an EU Marie Curie Excellence Grant CODICES-EXT-CT-2004-014202.

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Author notes

  1. W. Bonckaert

    Present address: Laboratoire d’Ethologie et de Cognitions Comparées, Université Paris Ouest Nanterre La Défense, 200 Avenue de la République, 92001, Nanterre Cedex, France

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Laboratory of Entomology, Zoological Institute, Department of Biology, Catholic University of Leuven, Naamsestraat 59, 3000, Leuven, Belgium

    W. Bonckaert, J. Billen & T. Wenseleers

  2. Chemical Ecology Group, School of Physical and Geographical Sciences, Lennard–Jones Laboratory, Keele University, Keele, ST5 5BG, UK

    F. P. Drijfhout

  3. Centre for Social Evolution, Department of Biology, University of Copenhagen, Universitetsparken 15, 2100, Copenhagen, Denmark

    P. d’Ettorre

  4. Laboratoire d’Ethologie Expérimentale et Comparée, Université Paris 13, Villetaneuse, France

    P. d’Ettorre

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Table S1

Hydrocarbon composition (% ± SD) of the surface of queen-laid (Q-laid) and worker-laid (W-laid) eggs and of the cuticle of reproductive queens (Q), spring-collected queens (SQ), virgin queens (VQ), and workers with fully-developed (FD), partially developed (PD), and undeveloped ovaries (UND) in Vespula vulgaris. For dimethyl alkanes, x represents the position of the second methyl group. For instance, for peak 6, x = 7, 9, 11, and 13 is used to denote that peak 6 was composed of a mixture of 5,7-, 5,9-, 5,11-, and 5,13-diMeC23. For peaks 45, 46, and 48, the positions of the methyl groups were not identifiable (DOCX 29 kb)

Table S2

Factor loadings of the hydrocarbon compounds on the six PCs with an eigenvalue greater than 1. For information on the value of x, see Table S1 (DOCX 24 kb)

Table S3

Classification matrix showing the correct classification of queen-laid (Q-laid) and worker-laid (W-laid) eggs in Vespula vulgaris based on the cuticular hydrocarbons on the egg surface (DOCX 18 kb)

Table S4

Classification matrix showing the correct classification of reproductive queens (Q), spring-collected queens (SQ), virgin queens (VQ), and workers with fully-developed (FD), partially developed (PD), and undeveloped ovaries (UND) in Vespula vulgaris based on their cuticular hydrocarbon profiles (DOCX 19 kb)

Table S5

Classification matrix showing the correct classification of workers to their colony of origin in Vespula vulgaris based on their cuticular hydrocarbon profiles (DOCX 18 kb)

Table S6

Factor loadings of the hydrocarbon compounds on the seven PCs with an eigenvalue greater than 1. For information on the value of x, see Table S1 (DOCX 24 kb)

Table S7

Classification matrix showing the correct classification of workers with undeveloped ovaries to their colony of origin in Vespula vulgaris based on their cuticular hydrocarbon profiles (DOCX 18 kb)

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Bonckaert, W., Drijfhout, F.P., d’Ettorre, P. et al. Hydrocarbon Signatures of Egg Maternity, Caste Membership and Reproductive Status in the Common Wasp. J Chem Ecol 38, 42–51 (2012). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10886-011-0055-9

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