Reproductive constraints, direct fitness and indirect fitness benefits explain helping behaviour in the primitively eusocial wasp, Polistes canadensis.

Polistes canadensis wasp , benefits explain helping behaviour in the primitively eusocial Reproductive constraints , direct fitness and indirect fitness

Unrelated Helpers in a Primitively Eusocial Wasp: Is Helping Tailored Towards Direct Fitness?

The paper wasp Polistes dominulus is unique among the social insects in that nearly one-third of co-foundresses are completely unrelated to the dominant individual whose offspring they help to rear and yet reproductive skew is high. These unrelated subordinates stand to gain direct fitness through nest inheritance, raising the question of whether their behaviour is adaptively tailored towards m...

Long live the wasp: adult longevity in captive colonies of the eusocial paper wasp Polistes canadensis (L.)

Insects have been used as an exemplary model in studying longevity, from extrinsic mortality pressures to intrinsic senescence. In the highly eusocial insects, great degrees of variation in lifespan exist between morphological castes in relation to extreme divisions of labour, but of particular interest are the primitively eusocial insects. These species represent the ancestral beginnings of eu...

Helping effort in primitively eusocial wasps

In primitively eusocial and cooperatively breeding societies, there is substantial individual variation in helping effort that is not accounted for by variation in genetic relatedness. In primitively eusocial wasps, helpers have a significant chance of inheriting breeding positions. Recent models suggest that because helpers with greater expected future fitness have more to lose, they should in...

Radio-Tagging Technology Reveals Extreme Nest-Drifting Behavior in a Eusocial Insect

Kin-selection theory underlies our basic understanding of social evolution [1, 2]. Nest drifting in eusocial insects (where workers move between nests) presents a challenge to this paradigm, since a worker should remain as a helper on her natal colony, rather than visit other colonies to which she is less closely related. Here we reveal nest drifting as a strategy by which workers may maximize ...