Queen loss changes behavior and increases longevity in a stingless bee

• Published in: Behavioral ecology and sociobiology Vol. 74; no. 3; pp. 1 - 9
• Main Authors: dos Santos Conceição Lopes, Bárbara, Campbell, Alistair John, Contrera, Felipe Andrés León
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: Berlin/Heidelberg Springer Science + Business Media 01-03-2020; Springer Berlin Heidelberg; Springer Nature B.V
• Subjects: Animal Ecology; Bees; Behavioral Sciences; Biomedical and Life Sciences; Colonies; Construction; Critical period; Egg laying; Eggs; Foraging behavior; Genomes; Life Sciences; Life span; Longevity; Nest building; ORIGINAL ARTICLE; Oviposition; Queenless; Queens; Scaptotrigona; Species; Workers; Workers (insect caste); Zoology; aff; Stingless bees; Life expectancy; Social organization; Foraging; Orphanage
• ISSN: 0340-5443; 1432-0762
• DOI: 10.1007/s00265-020-2811-8

The death of the queen can lead to behavioral changes in workers of eusocial bees that alter their longevity. Here, we investigated the behavior and longevity of workers in colonies of the neotropical stingless bee Scaptotrigona aff. postica in the absence of a mated queen. Eight colonies, four being queenright, and four with their physogastric queens removed (queenless), were used in experiments. Emerging workers were marked with different colors to obtain age cohorts. We observed external foraging activity, age of workers involved in cell construction and foraging, and worker longevity in all colonies for 100 days. Over time, queenless colonies presented a greater reduction in external activity than queenright colonies; older workers were more frequently observed participating in cell construction and foraging compared with queenright colonies, and worker lifespan in queenless colonies was about a third longer than that observed in queenright colonies. Our study demonstrates that orphaned workers of this species substantially alter their behavior, causing an increase in their overall longevity and workers starting to lay haploid eggs, allowing some direct reproduction by workers in the absence of a queen.