To reunite or not: A study of artificially fragmented Diacamma indicum ant colonies

Sahu, Prateek K.; Kolay, Swetashree; Annagiri, Sumana

doi:10.1016/j.beproc.2018.10.017

Cited by 5 publications

(3 citation statements)

References 25 publications

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“…In the eld, forces such as nest relocation frequently cause their colonies to face biased age structure (38,39,41), and divided colonies are observed to fuse in D. cf. indicum (H. Shimoji, personal observation) and in the related ant species D. indicum (43). In these uctuating environmental conditions, the bidirectional task shifting that we observed is expected to cause a prompt DOL reconstruction.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 64%

Individual experience influences reconstruction of division of labour under colony disturbance in a queenless ant species (Diacamma cf. indicum)

Shimoji

Tanaka

Hojo

2022

Preprint

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BackgroundDivision of labour (DOL) is ubiquitous across biological hierarchies. In eusocial insects, DOL is often characterized by age-related task allocation, but workers can flexibly change their tasks, allowing for DOL reconstruction in fluctuating environments. Behavioural change driven by individual experience is regarded as a key to understanding this task flexibility. However, experimental evidence for the influence of individual experience is remains sparse. Here we tested the effect of individual experience on task choice in the queenless ponerine ant (Diacamma cf. indicum) from Japan.ResultsWe confirmed that both nurses and foragers shifted to vacant tasks when the colony composition was biased to one or the other. We also found that task-shifted foragers continue nursing for a long time in disturbed colonies, whereas task-shifted nurses persist in their original task, even if they recently foraged. ConclusionsTaken together, our results suggest that individual experience decreases the response threshold of original foragers, as they continue to be specialist nurses in a disturbed colony. However, original nurses do not appear strongly affected by having forager experience and revert to being nurses. Therefore, while individual experience does have an effect, other factors, such as reproductive ability, are clearly required to understand DOL maintenance in fluctuating environments.

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Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 64%

Individual experience influences reconstruction of division of labour under colony disturbance in a queenless ant species (Diacamma cf. indicum)

Shimoji

Tanaka

Hojo

2022

Preprint

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show abstract

“…In the field, forces such as nest relocation frequently cause their colonies to face biased age structure [ 39 , 40 , 42 ], and divided colonies are observed to fuse in D. cf. indicum (H. Shimoji, personal observation) and in the related ant species D. indicum [ 44 ]. In these fluctuating environmental conditions, the bidirectional task shifting that we observed is expected to cause a prompt DOL reconstruction.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Individual experience influences reconstruction of division of labour under colony disturbance in a queenless ant species

2022

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

Background Division of labour (DOL) is ubiquitous across biological hierarchies. In eusocial insects, DOL is often characterized by age-related task allocation, but workers can flexibly change their tasks, allowing for DOL reconstruction in fluctuating environments. Behavioural change driven by individual experience is regarded as a key to understanding this task flexibility. However, experimental evidence for the influence of individual experience is remains sparse. Here we tested the effect of individual experience on task choice in the queenless ponerine ant, Diacamma cf. indicum from Japan. Results We confirmed that both nurses and foragers shifted to vacant tasks when the colony composition was biased to one or the other. We also found that nurses which are induced to forage readily revert to nursing when reintroduced into balanced colonies. In contrast, foragers which are induced to revert to nursing very rarely return to a foraging role, even 19 days post reintroduction to their original colony. Conclusions Taken together, our results suggest that individual experience decreases the response threshold of original foragers, as they continue to be specialist nurses in a disturbed colony. However, original nurses do not appear strongly affected by having forager experience and revert to being nurses. Therefore, while individual experience does have an effect, other factors, such as reproductive ability, are clearly required to understand DOL maintenance in fluctuating environments.

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“…1B); this has rarely been observed in Temnothorax , possibly due to its potential interference with route-learning. Furthermore, although emigrating Diacamma colonies prefer better nest sites (Sahu et al, 2019), they can excavate their own underground nests from pre-existing openings on the ground (Bhattacharyya et al, 2021; Kaur et al, 2012), and thus are less limited by nest site availability than Temnothorax .…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Cryptic functional diversity in ant tandem runs

Mizumoto

Tanaka

Valentini

et al. 2022

Preprint

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Ants have evolved diverse recruitment methods to guide colony members to valuable resources, such as food or nest sites. One of these methods, tandem running, consists of an informed leader directly guiding a naive follower every step of the way from nest to resource. Although this behavior appears superficially similar in the different ant taxa in which it has independently evolved, this similarity could conceal underlying functional and mechanistic differences. Here we present a combined network and information-theoretic analysis, which reveals fundamental differences in the tandem recruitment between two distantly related ant genera, Temnothorax and Diacamma. Temnothorax uses tandem running to recruit additional recruiters, whereas Diacamma uses it principally to move the passive majority of the colony, a task that Temnothorax accomplishes with a different behavior, social carrying. Accordingly, the structure of the tandem run recruitment networks of Diacamma was different from those of Temnothorax, with Diacamma networks more closely resembling the social carrying networks of Temnothorax. Furthermore, an information-theoretic analysis of the spatial trajectories of leaders and followers revealed that Diacamma tandem runs lack bidirectional information flow, the signature of route-learning in Temnothorax tandem runs. These results suggest that Diacamma uses tandem runs not to share information, but to transport nestmates. By quantifying the cryptic diversity of communication behavior, this study increases the resolution of our understanding of animal societies.

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To reunite or not: A study of artificially fragmented Diacamma indicum ant colonies

Cited by 5 publications

References 25 publications

Individual experience influences reconstruction of division of labour under colony disturbance in a queenless ant species (Diacamma cf. indicum)

Individual experience influences reconstruction of division of labour under colony disturbance in a queenless ant species (Diacamma cf. indicum)

Individual experience influences reconstruction of division of labour under colony disturbance in a queenless ant species

Cryptic functional diversity in ant tandem runs

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