On status badges and quality signals in the paper wasp Polistes dominulus: body size,facial colour patterns and hierarchical rank

摘要

To establish a dominance order, social animals often rely on indicators of fighting to avoid costly aggressiveencounters. In some species, individuals use colour patterns to signal their social status. Recent studiesclaimed that facial markings in the eusocial paper wasp Polistes dominulus are status badges that allowco-foundresses to form a linear hierarchy based on individual quality. Here, we evaluated facial patterns innatural populations of P dominulus, in its native range, to observe whether the marks reflect overall waspquality in different contexts. We used the same measures of clypeus patterns used by earlier studies, but didnot find that they functioned as status badges. Our analyses showed no evidence that visual markers arerelated to: (i) size, (ii) probability of surviving winter, (iii) social rank in spring associations, or (iv) healthstatus (assessed by the presence of strepsipteran endoparasites). Size, however, is important. Larger waspsare more likely to survive the winter and to acquire the dominant position in spring associations. Larvaeinfected with endoparasites become smaller adult wasps. These findings suggest that body size is a reliablequality indicator on which wasps build their social networks, and that clypeus patterning is not involved.