Abstract:Alternative female reproductive strategies are more abundant in ants than other animals. Most cases involve morphological polymorphism in the queen which depends on the colony founding strategies. In the present study, we revealed the conditional mating tactics of the queen of the inquiline ant Vollenhovia nipponica. The queens had two mating tactics, mating in nests and by nuptial flight. Field collections of parasitized colonies in autumn and springyielded colonies that usually included virgin alate queens a… Show more
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