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Costs of delayed dispersal and alloparental care in the fungus-cultivating ambrosia beetle Xyleborus affinis Eichhoff (Scolytinae: Curculionidae)

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Abstract

Body reserves may determine the reproductive output of animals, depending on their resource allocation strategy. In insects, an accumulation of reserves for reproduction is often obtained before dispersal by pre-emergence (or maturation) feeding. This has been assumed to be an important cause of delayed dispersal from the natal nest in scolytine beetles. In the cooperatively breeding ambrosia beetles, this is of special interest because in this group delayed dispersal could serve two alternative purposes: “selfish” maturation feeding or “altruistic” alloparental care. To distinguish between these two possibilities, we have experimentally studied the effect of delayed dispersal on future reproductive output in the xyleborine ambrosia beetle Xyleborus affinis. Females experimentally induced to disperse and delayed dispersing females did not differ in their body condition at dispersal and in their founding success afterwards, which indicates that females disperse independently of condition, and staying adult females are fully mature and would be able to breed. However, induced dispersers produced more offspring than delayed dispersers within a test period of 40 days. This suggests that delayed dispersal comes at a cost to females, which may result primarily from alloparental care and leads to a reduced reproductive output. Alternatively, females might have reproduced prior to dispersal. This is unlikely, however, for the majority of dispersing females because of the small numbers of offspring present in the gallery when females dispersed, suggesting that mainly the foundress had reproduced. In addition, “gallery of origin” was a strong predictor of the reproductive success of females, which may reflect variation in the microbial complex transmitted vertically from the natal nest to the daughter colony, or variation of genetic quality. These results have important implications for the understanding of proximate mechanisms selecting for philopatry and alloparental care in highly social ambrosia beetles and other cooperatively breeding arthropods.

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Acknowledgements

We are grateful to Stacy Blomqvist and Eric Ott for collecting X. affinis in the field and starting the first lab galleries. This manuscript benefitted greatly from comments of Tabea Turrini, Dik Heg and two anonymous reviewers. The study was supported by a cooperative agreement between the Department of Behavioral Ecology, University of Bern and the Southern Research Station, USDA Forest Service. PHWB is a recipient of a DOC fellowship of the Austrian Academy of Sciences at the Department of Behavioural Ecology, University of Bern, and was partly funded by a fellowship of the Roche Research Foundation.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Behavioural Ecology, Institute of Ecology and Evolution, University of Berne, Baltzerstrasse 6, 3012, Bern, Switzerland

    Peter H. W. Biedermann & Michael Taborsky

  2. USDA Forest Service, Southern Research Station, 2500 Shreveport Hwy, Pineville, LA, 71360, USA

    Peter H. W. Biedermann & Kier D. Klepzig

  3. US Forest Service, Southern Research Station, 200 WT Weaver Blvd, Asheville, NC, 28804, USA

    Kier D. Klepzig

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  1. Peter H. W. Biedermann
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Correspondence to Peter H. W. Biedermann.

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Communicated by N. Wedell

Appendix

Appendix

Fig. 3
figure 3

Total numbers of eggs produced by the two experimental groups of females 40 days after the treatment. Induced dispersers laid more eggs than delayed dispersers overall (GEE: P < 0.001). Numbers of daughter galleries included (induced dispersers/delayed dispersers): gallery1 (2/2), G2 (5/6), G3 (5/5), G4 (5/2), G5 (4/4) and G6 (12/11). Arithmetic means are shown with their standard errors

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Fig. 4
figure 4

Comparison of the body weight of females from the two experimental groups collected in four galleries. There was no significant difference between induced and delayed dispersers (GEE: P = 0.95). Numbers of galleries included (induced dispersers/delayed dispersers): gallerya (9/2), Gb (12/7), Gc (4/1) and Gd (6/3). Arithmetic means of dry weight are shown with their standard errors

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Biedermann, P.H.W., Klepzig, K.D. & Taborsky, M. Costs of delayed dispersal and alloparental care in the fungus-cultivating ambrosia beetle Xyleborus affinis Eichhoff (Scolytinae: Curculionidae). Behav Ecol Sociobiol 65, 1753–1761 (2011). https://doi.org/10.1007/s00265-011-1183-5

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