Evidence for risk-taking behavioural types and potential effects on resource acquisition in a parasitoid wasp

Abstract

Consistent individual differences in behaviour, also called behavioural types, are often observed in animal populations and can correlate to form behavioural syndromes. Behavioural types and syndromes have consequences in various fields of ecology, from species interactions to ecosystem services, notably through the role they can play in the slow–fast life history continuum. Individuals differ in their life history strategies along this continuum according to their relative investment in reproduction or survival, and the pace-of-life syndrome (POLS) hypothesis predicts a coevolution between these life history strategies and behavioural types linked to risk taking. In this framework, the aim of our study was thus to investigate the existence of behavioural types and their links with life history traits in the parasitoid hymenopteran Venturia canescens . We considered two behaviours, exploration and activity, that are linked to risk taking and resource acquisition, and three life history traits, longevity, egg load and offspring production rate. We found consistent individual differences in both exploration and activity. However, contrary to the predictions of the POLS, the behavioural types did not correlate with each other or with the life history traits tested. We thus found no evidence of a POLS in V. canescens . However, the existence of behavioural types in female parasitoids may be of utmost importance for biological control efficiency.