Secretions of mandibular glands are not involved in the elicitation of rescue behaviour in Formica cinerea ants

Abstract

Certain ants perform rescue behaviour for other ants that require help, and the expression of rescue behaviour is hypothesized to depend on signals (“calls for help”) sent by the imperilled individuals. We studied whether the mandibular glands were involved in the elicitation of rescue behaviour in Formica cinerea Mayr ants. In the first experiment, we determined the occurrence and characteristics of rescue behaviour directed towards nest mates with impaired mandibular gland communication. We did not observe any difference in rescue behaviour directed towards individuals who were untreated, treated with paint over the mandibles, or sham-treated with paint over the thorax. In the second experiment, we determined whether rescue behaviour would occur towards dummy ants coated with the contents of the mandibular glands. Compared with the control untreated nest mates, we found that rescue behaviour was not directed towards either the untreated dummy ants or the dummy ants covered with crushed mandibular glands. Our results indicated that the “call for help” signal does not originate from the mandibular glands. Therefore, we propose that gaster-tip glands represent a plausible alternative source of rescue-eliciting pheromone(s) for the F. cinerea ants examined in this study.Electronic supplementary materialThe online version of this article (doi:10.1007/s00040-017-0547-x) contains supplementary material, which is available to authorized users.

Ants Co-Occurring with Predatory Antlions Show Unsuccessful Rescue Behavior towards Captured Nestmates

“…Antlions inject paralytics into their captured prey; these paralytics cause paralysis in ants at a maximum of 2 min after injection (Griffiths 1980;Matsuda et al 1995;Nishiwaki et al 2007). Taking into account the fact that the captured ant has to "call for help" to elicit rescue in its nestmates (Czechowski et al 2002;Frank et al 2017;Miler and Kuszewska 2017), these 2 min leave little room for a successful rescue action, which is expressed after a delay (here, median latency ± SD: 42 ± 31 s). It seems plausible that rescue behavioral patterns in F. cinerea, and possibly other sand-dwelling ants, are more of an artefact in the context of antlion larva capture (stemming, e.g., from ants' inability to differentiate between entrapment contexts).…”

“…Using artificial traps placed inside aggregation zones of these antlions in the field, we determined whether antlions and ants closely co-occurred. We predicted that ants would comprise the majority of the potential prey and that Formica cinerea ants would be the main potential prey item, a species known to display rescue behavior (Miler 2016;Miler and Kuszewska 2017;Miler et al 2017c, d). Thus, we also addressed the question of whether rescue attempts of F. cinerea workers decrease the hunting success of antlions.…”

Increased Risk Proneness or Social Withdrawal? The Effects of Shortened Life Expectancy on the Expression of Rescue Behavior in Workers of the ant Formica cinerea (Hymenoptera: Formicidae)

“…The behavior of the rescuer must also be generally suited to the circumstances, and not inherently rewarding or beneficial to the rescuer (Hollis and Nowbahari 2012 ). Behavior patterns involved in ant rescue behavior were investigated in several experimental studies by means of two bioassays: the antlion larva capture bioassay (Czechowski et al 2002 ; Taylor et al 2013 ; Miler 2016 ; Miler et al 2017 ) and the entrapment bioassay (Nowbahari et al 2009 , 2012 , 2016 ; Hollis and Nowbahari 2013 ; Duhoo et al 2017 ; Miler and Kuszewska 2017 ; Miler et al 2017 ). Antlion larvae display quite sophisticated hunting techniques: they construct pitfall traps to catch insect prey, especially ants (Hollis et al 2015 ; Hollis 2017 ).…”

Dyadic Nestmate Reunion Test in the Research on Ant Social Behavior

“…Other ant species tested in these studies included two other formicine species, Polyrhachis laboriosa (Mercier et al 1997) and Cataglyphis iberica (daHbi and lenoir 1998), and myrmicine species Acromyrmex octospinosus (JutsuM et al 1979), Leptothorax nylanderi and Leptothorax gredleri (Heinze et al 1996), andA. senilis (icHinose et al 2005 Since several years dyadic nestmate rescue tests consisting of a confrontation of a single freely moving ant with a single endangered nestmate (captured by a predator or entrapped in an artificial snare) were also increasingly frequently used in the research investigating various aspects of ant rescue behavior (Taylor et al 2013;Miler 2016;Miler et al 2017a, b;Miler and kuszeWska 2017). These studies documented many interesting phenomena.…”

“…The research on ant rescue behavior was carried out both in the field and laboratory conditions with the use of two main bioassays: antlion larva capture bioassay, in which rescue behavior of the tested ants is elicited by stimuli emitted by a victim ant captured by a predatory antlion larva (czecHoWski et al 2002;Miler 2016;Miler et al 2017a, b;Taylor et al 2013), and artificial snare (entrapment) bioassay, in which rescue behavior of potential rescuers is elicited by stimuli emitted by a victim ant entrapped in an artificial snare (noWbaHari et al 2009(noWbaHari et al , 2012(noWbaHari et al , 2016Hollis and noWbaHari 2013b;Taylor et al 2013;cicHoń 2017;duHoo et al 2017;kurasz-kieWicz 2017;Miler et al 2017a, b;Miler and kuszeWska 2017). Recently, uy et al (2019) used a modified version of the entrapment bioassay in which victim ants, workers of the weaver ant Oecophylla smaragdina, were experimentally immobilized by being wrapped in spider silk.…”