Ants Sense, and Follow, Trail Pheromones of Ant Community Members.

Jaime M Chalissery,Danielle Hoefele,Gerhard Gries,Santosh Kumar Alamsetti,Regine Gries,Asim Renyard

doi:10.3390/insects10110383

Abstract

Ants deposit trail pheromones that guide nestmates to food sources. We tested the hypotheses that ant community members (Western carpenter ants, Camponotus modoc; black garden ants, Lasius niger; European fire ants, Myrmica rubra) (1) sense, and follow, each other’s trail pheromones, and (2) fail to recognize trail pheromones of allopatric ants (pavement ants, Tetramorium caespitum; desert harvester ants, Novomessor albisetosus; Argentine ants, Linepithema humilis). In gas chromatographic-electroantennographic detection analyses of a six-species synthetic trail pheromone blend (6-TPB), La. niger, Ca. modoc, and M. rubra sensed the trail pheromones of all community members and unexpectedly that of T. caespitum. Except for La. niger, all species did not recognize the trail pheromones of N. albisetosus and Li. humilis. In bioassays, La. niger workers followed the 6-TPB trail for longer distances than their own trail pheromone, indicating an additive effect of con- and hetero-specific pheromones on trail-following. Moreover, Ca. modoc workers followed the 6-TPB and their own trail pheromones for similar distances, indicating no adverse effects of heterospecific pheromones on trail-following. Our data show that ant community members eavesdrop on each other’s trail pheromones, and that multiple pheromones can be combined in a lure that guides multiple species of pest ants to lethal food baits.

Highlights

Ant colonies use multimodal communication signals to coordinate specific tasks such as foraging, nest defense, and cooperative brood care [1]
Antennae of Ca. modoc responded to 2,5-dimethylpyrazine, 3-ethyl-2,5-dimethylpyrazine, 3-ethyl-2,6-dimethyl
2).pyrazine, Antennae of Ca. modoc responded to 2,5-dimethylpyrazine, 3-ethyl-2,5-dimethylpyrazine, hexanolide, and isocoumarin (Figure 2; Table 2)

Summary

Introduction

Ant colonies use multimodal communication signals to coordinate specific tasks such as foraging, nest defense, and cooperative brood care [1]. When a forager has located a profitable food source and returns to her nest, she deposits trail pheromones that guide nest mates to the same resource [2]. Pheromone trails leading to persistent food sources are generally well maintained by foragers [2]. Are readily exploited by (heterospecific) non-nestmates [1,5] that learn about the location of profitable food sources through eavesdropping [6,7,8,9]. Aggressive encounters of ants with non-nest mates on shared (eavesdropped) trails [1,8,9] are kept to a minimum, in part, by using dissimilar foraging schedules.

Methods

Results

Discussion

Conclusion