Author： Rheindt Frank
Publisher： Springer Publishing Company
ISSN： 0340-5443
Source： Behavioral Ecology and Sociobiology, Vol.56, Iss.5, 2004-09, pp. : 472-481
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Abstract
High effective multiple queen mating is a rare but taxonomically widespread phenomenon in eusocial Hymenoptera that has arisen convergently in several taxa. In ants, high effective mating frequencies have been confirmed in only two clades: the higher leaf-cutters (Atta, Acromyrmex</i>) and the Pogonomyrmex</i> seed harvesters. We analysed polyandry in Pogonomyrmex badius</i>, which has a life-history unique within the genus, and report the highest numerical mating frequencies thus far recorded in ants. We also show that P. badius</i> is characterized by one of the highest effective mating frequencies hitherto found in ants. It is now clear that all major sub-clades of Pogonomyrmex sensu stricto</i> exhibit high levels of polyandry. Therefore, multiple mating must have arisen early in the evolution of the genus, and may have constituted a mechanism to increase offspring variability for queens that were confronted with increasingly complex levels of organization. Too few congeners have been investigated by the same method to be certain that polyandry in P. badius</i> is really higher than in the rest of the genus. If so, research should concentrate on a possible link between high queen mating frequency and the distinct caste system found in P. badius</i>.
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