This paper discusses the different social parasites of ants, evolutionary routes to inquilism and other specialized forms of social parasitism, and host specificity in social parasites. Case histories of host specificity and the degree of integration in 3 social parasite systems, i.e. Maculinea arion and Maculinea teleius (high virulence, low transmission predators of ant brood, which enter host colonies in their final larval instar and mainly inhabit the outer nest chambers), Maculinea rebeli and Maculinea alcon (high virulence, low transmission cuckoo feeders in ant brood chambers, which enter host colonies in their last larval instar), Microdon mutabilis and Microdon myrmicae (high infestation, low transmission predators in ant brood chambers, which enter host colonies as eggs), and the testing and calibration of 2 host specificity hypotheses are presented.
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