Only mothers feed mature offspring in European Ceratina bees

‐ Feeding of mature offspring is an uncommon type of care about offspring but usual in small carpenter bees (Ceratina).‐ We detected feeding of offspring by mother in three EuropeanCeratina bees.‐ However, sisters do not care about siblings compared to some other species of the same genus. AbstractParental care directed to adult offspring is uncommon in animals. Such parental care has been documented in Xylocopinae bees (Hymenoptera: Apidae). Moreover, someCeratina bees (Xylocopinae) are known to feed mature siblings, and feeding of mature siblings is achieved by dwarf eldest daughters when mothers died. These daughters are intentionally malnourished by mothers and usually originate from the first brood cell.Here, we examined the pattern of care provided to young adults in three small European carpenter bees:Ceratina (Ceratina)cucurbitina,C. (Euceratina)chalybea, andC. (E.)nigrolabiata. Observations of nest departures and arrivals were performed to study foraging behavior. We detected intensive foraging behavior of mothers in all three studied species. However, we did not observe regular foraging behavior of daughters in any species. The experimental removal of mothers inC. cucurbitina led to the emigration of young adults and did not initiate foraging activity in daughters. We conclude that the feeding of siblings does not occur in these species unlike in the American speciesC. calcarata. We detected female ‐biased sex ratios in the first brood cell inC. cucurbitina ...

Source: Insect Science - August 27, 2020 Category: Biology Authors: Michael Mik át, Jitka Waldhauserová, Tereza Fraňková, Kateřina Čermáková, Vojtěch Brož, Šimon Zeman, Marcela Dokulilová, Jakub Straka Tags: ORIGINAL ARTICLE Source Type: research