Persistence of females that produce only female progeny in lepidoptera

Abstract

In Lepidoptera females that produce only female progeny, can be found in wild populations of at least 11 species. The genetic variation is passed on to each generation of female offspring. If genetically abnormal females produce more female offspring than normal females do and mating is random, then populations containing these abnormal females will have a biased population sex ratio. Unmated females will increase due to the scarcity of males and so the population as a unit will die out. Several possible biological explanations for the persistence of the genetic variation have been proposed. But experiments and observations have not verified those hypotheses. Simulations of Heuch's model (1978), however, have shown that the variation persists if the population is distributed, in patches and there is dispersal among patches, even when insects disperse at random. Abnormal females tend to persist at both low and high migration rates, but the probability of persistence is higher at high migration rates. It has been suggested that abnormal females in a population are an adaptation, but the results of this investigation show that this explanation, may not be plausible.