Abstract
Insect societies are often confronted with choices among several options such as food sources of different richness or potential nest sites with different qualities. The mechanisms by which a colony as a whole evaluates these situations and takes the appropriate decision are of crucial importance for its survival. Here we studied how collective decisions arise from individual behaviors when a group of workers of the ant Messor barbarus is given a choice between two aggregation sites. Two hundred ants were introduced into an arena and given a choice between two tubes connected to the arena. The tubes had different physical properties: dry and transparent (termed as dry), humid and transparent (termed as humid), or dry and dark (termed as dark). After 30 min, most ants were found to be aggregated in a humid tube when paired with a dry tube, or in a dark tube when paired with a humid one. When two humid tubes were in competition, ants aggregate more in one of the sites. The choice of ants was consistent throughout experiments. An analysis of individual behaviors shows that the probability of an ant recruiting and the intensity of its trail-laying behavior strongly depend on the quality of the tubes. Our study suggests that the selection of an aggregation site does not require that individual ants directly compare sites, but rather relies on the synergy between amplification processes involving recruitment by chemical trails, and a modulation of the individual resting time in a site as a function of its population.
This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.
Similar content being viewed by others
References
Amé JM, Rivault C, Deneubourg JL (2003) Cockroach aggregation based on strain odour recognition. Anim Behav (in press)
Beckers R, Deneubourg JL, Goss S, Pasteels JM (1990) Collective decision making through food recruitment. Insectes Soc 37:258–267
Beckers R, Deneubourg JL, Goss S (1992) Trail laying behavior during food recruitment in the ant Lasius niger (L.). Insectes Soc 39:59–72
Beckers R, Deneubourg JL, Goss S (1993) Modulation of trail laying in the ant Lasius niger (Hymenoptera, Formicidae) and its role in the collective selection of a food source. J Insect Behav 6:751–759
Bhatkar AP, Withcomb WH (1970) Artificial diet for rearing various species of ants. Fla Entomol 53:229–232
Camazine S, Deneubourg JL, Franks NR, Sneyd J, Theraulaz G, Bonabeau E (2001) Self-organization in biological systems. Princeton University Press, Princeton, NJ
Cerdan P (1989) Etude de la biologie, de l’écologie et du comportement des fourmis moissonneuses du genre Messor (Hymenoptera, Formicidae) en Crau. PhD Thesis, University of Aix-Marseille I
Coglitore C, Cammaerts MC (1981) Etude du pouvoir agrégatif des reines de Myrmica rubra L. Insectes Soc 4:353–370
Deneubourg JL, Lioni A, Detrain C (2002) Dynamics of aggregation and emergence of cooperation. Biol Bull 202:262–267
Franks NR, Pratt SC, Mallon EB, Britton NF, Sumpter DJT (2002) Information flow, opinion polling and collective intelligence in house-hunting social insects. Philos Trans R Soc Lond B 357:1567–1583
Franks NR, Mallon EB, Bray HE, Hamilton MJ, Mischler TC (2003) Strategies for choosing between alternatives with different attributes: exemplified by house-hunting ants. Anim Behav 65:215–223
Gotwald WH (1995) Army ants: the biology of social predation. Cornell University Press, New York
Heredia A, Detrain C (2000) Worker polymorphism and ethological role of sting associated glands in the harvester ant Messor barbarus. Insectes Soc 47:383–389
Hölldobler B, Wilson EO (1990) The ants. Belknap, Harvard University Press, Cambridge, Mass
Lioni A, Sauwens G, Theraulaz G, Deneubourg JL (2001) Chain formation in Oecophylla longidona. J Insect Behav 15:679–696
Mailleux AC, Deneubourg JL, Detrain C (2000) How do ants assess food volume? Anim Behav 59:1061–1069
Mallon EB, Franks NR (2000) Ants estimate area using Buffon’s needle. Proc R Soc Lond B 267:765–770
Mallon EB, Pratt SC, Franks NR (2001) Individual and collective decision-making during nest site selection by the ant Leptothorax albipennis. Behav Ecol Sociobiol 50:352–359
Mugford ST, Mallon EB, Franks NR (2001) The accuracy of Buffon’s needle: a rule of thumb used by ants to estimate area. Behav Ecol 12:655–658
Nicolis S, Deneubourg JL (1999) Emerging patterns and food recruitment in ants: an analytical study. J Theor Biol 198:575–592
Pratt SC, Mallon EB, Sumpter DJT, Franks NR (2002) Quorum sensing, recruitment, and collective decision-making during colony emigration by the ant Leptothorax albipennis. Behav Ecol Sociobiol 52:117–127
Rivault C, Cloarec A (1998) Cockroach aggregation: discrimination between strains odours in Blattella germanica. Anim Behav 55:177–184
Schneirla TC (1971) Army ants: a study in social organization. Freeman, San Francisco
Seeley TD (1977) Measurement of nest cavity volume by the honey bee (Apis mellifera). Behav Ecol Sociobiol 2:201–227
Seeley TD (1982) How honeybees find a home. Sci Am 247:158–168
Seeley TD (1995) The wisdom of the hive. Harvard University Press, Cambridge, Mass
Seeley TD, Buhrman SC (1999) Group decision making in swarms of honey bees. Behav Ecol Sociobiol 45:19–31
Seeley TD, Buhrman SC (2001) Nest-site selection in honey bees: how well do swarms implement the “best-of-N” rule? Behav Ecol Sociobiol 49:416–427
Seeley TD, Heinrich B (1981) Regulation of temperature in the nests of social insects. In: Heinrich B (ed) Insect thermoregulation. Wiley, New York, pp 159–234
Seeley TD, Morse RA (1978) Nest site selection by the honey bee (Apis mellifera). Insectes Soc 25:323–337
Seeley TD, Camazine S, Sneyd J (1991) Collective decision-making in honey bees: how colonies choose among nectar sources. Behav Ecol Sociobiol 28:277–290
Seeley TD, Mikheyev AS, Pagano GJ (2000) Dancing bees tune both duration and rate of waggle-run production in relation to nectar-source profitability. J Comp Physiol A 186:813–819
Visscher PK, Camazine S (1999) Collective decisions and cognition in bees. Nature 397:400
Zar JH (1999) Biostatistical analysis, 4th edn. Prentice-Hall, Upper Saddle River, NJ
Acknowledgements
We thank V. Fourcassié for stimulating discussions, S. Cazeaux and F. Fayret for technical assistance, three anonymous referees and L. Sundström for helpful comments. R. Jeanson was supported by a doctoral grant from the French Ministry of Scientific Research. J.-L. Deneubourg is research associate of the Belgian National Foundation for Scientific Research. This work was supported in part by the Programme Cognitique from the French Ministry of Scientific Research. Our research complies with the current laws in France.
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Corresponding author
Additional information
Communicated by L. Sundström
Rights and permissions
About this article
Cite this article
Jeanson, R., Deneubourg, JL., Grimal, A. et al. Modulation of individual behavior and collective decision-making during aggregation site selection by the ant Messor barbarus . Behav Ecol Sociobiol 55, 388–394 (2004). https://doi.org/10.1007/s00265-003-0716-y
Received:
Revised:
Accepted:
Published:
Issue Date:
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s00265-003-0716-y