Strength surpasses relatedness-queen larva selection in honeybees

Nepotism was initially theoretically predicted and sometimes found to trigger the selection of specific larvae to be reared as queens in the honeybee Apis mellifera. Although the importance of selecting the next queen for a colony indicates that it should not occur at random, nepotism is increasingly considered unlikely in eusocial insect societies. Different prenatal maternal supplies of embryos have been found to impact fitness in many other species and therefore could be a possible trigger underlying the likelihood of being raised as a queen. We offered related or unrelated larvae from six colonies originating from eggs of different weights for emergency queen rearing in queenless units with worker bees from these six colonies. We showed that nurses did not significantly prefer related larvae during queen rearing, which confirms the theory that different relatedness-driven kin preferences within a colony cannot be converted into a colony-level decision. However, we found that larvae originating from heavier eggs were significantly preferred for queen breeding. Studies on other species have shown that superior maternal supply is important for later reproductive success. However, we did observe tendencies in the expected direction (e.g., queens that hatched from heavier eggs had both more ovarioles and a shorter preoviposition period). Nevertheless, our data do not allow for a significant conclusion that the selection of larvae from heavy eggs truly offers fitness advantages.

Automated summary

Nepotism is not a significant factor in the selection of queen larvae in honeybee colonies, but larvae from heavier eggs are preferred for queen rearing. While there are some indications that queens from heavier eggs may have advantages in reproductive success, the data are not sufficient to draw a significant conclusion.