Mating frequency and maternity of males in Melipona mondury (Hymenoptera: Apidae)

Abstract

In eusocial bees, multiple mating can increase colony fitness, but decreases relatedness between female offspring and causes a conflict between workers for male parentage. In this work, the paternity and maternity of males in Melipona mondury were evaluated using microsatellite loci. Contrary to expectation, 78 % of M. mondury queens had multiple mates (2-7 mates). The genetic relatedness between sister workers ranged from 0.53 to 0.90 in polyandrous colonies. The production of males by workers ranged from 0 to 100 %, with a mean value of 50 %, following the common pattern reported for stingless bees, mainly Melipona species. The high worker-worker relatedness in polyandrous colonies favored worker reproduction. These results corroborate inclusive fitness theory and can support future conservation genetics studies of stingless bees.

Post-embryonic Development of the Seminal Vesicle in the Stingless Bee Melipona quadrifasciata Lepeletier, 1836 (Apidae: Meliponini)

“…The histochemical composition of the luminal contents of the seminal vesicle of M. quadrifasciata during the pupal stages shows a large amount of carbohydrates, low lipid and protein contents, which may act in reducing oxidative stress during the storage of spermatozoa in the organ. Although experimental manipulations suggest multiple mating in M. quadrifasciata (Lopes et al, 2003) and microsatellite analyses confirm polyandry in M. mondury (Viana et al, 2015), the ejaculated material during sperm transfer associated with the physical barrier of the chitin-lined organs of the reproductive tract in M. quadrifasciata may favor the monarchical behavior of this bee, preventing multiple mating.…”

Gene Flow from Wild to Managed Colonies in the Stingless Bee Scaptotrigona Mexicana and an Update on its Mating Frequency

“…Within the highly polyandrous Apis dorsata, queens can mate with 13 to 39 males (Oldroyd et al, 1996). Similarly, in Melipona mondury, seven out of nine queens had a high degree of polyandry (2-7 patrilines) (Viana et al, 2015). The stingless bee S. postica has been found to be multiple-mated in some colonies (Paxton et al, 1999a), and singly mated in others (Peters et al, 1999).…”

Investigaciones con abejas sin aguijón (Hymenoptera: Meliponini) y aplicabilidad de los marcadores moleculares: Una revisión sistemática de la literatura

“…Dos artigos disponíveis no banco de dados da WOS, os marcadores desenvolvidos para M. bicolor foram os que mais se destacaram nos estudos, sendo utilizados nas mais diferentes espécies, com destaque para as abelhas dos gêneros Melipona, Scaptotrigona, Plebeia e Partamona (Tabela 3). A transferência de marcadores foi mais efetiva entre espécies mais próximas evolutivamente (Viana et al, 2015;Hurtado-Burillo et al, 2016). Apesar da distância evolutiva, o marcador B124, desenvolvido para Bombus terrestres, teve bastante êxito em Scaptotrigona mexicana, tendo demonstrado alto número de alelos em algumas das populações analisadas (Hurtado-Burillo et al, 2016).…”