The Life Histories of the "Uruçu Amarela" Males (Melipona flavolineata, Apidae, Meliponini)

Jamille Costa Veiga,Kamila Leão Leão,Ana Carolina Martins De Queiroz,Felipe Andrés León Contrera,Beatriz Woiski Coelho,Cristiano Menezes

doi:10.13102/sociobiology.v65i4.3451

Abstract

Here we describe the life histories of adult males of the the Amazonian stingless bee Melipona flavolineata Friese, commonly known as “uruçu amarela”. Males reach sexual maturity inside nests, presenting seminal vesicles full of sperm cells and becoming able to fl y at a mean age of 10 and 15 days, respectively. They aggregate twice in their lives, once before leaving the nest, and another at external congregation sites, by using their capacity to reach congregation sites dependent on morphological attributes, such as large eyes and elongated thorax. Furthermore, we describe three atypical phenomena for Meliponini males: M. fl avolineata males have dimorphic color pattern; they lose their genital capsules, even when they fail to copulate; and penisless (sterile) males can stay alive for up to two days. The life history strategies of Meliponini males have only just started to be told and provide many interesting questions for future studies.

Highlights

To study sexual maturation in M. flavolineata males, we used the total number of sperm cells in seminal vesicles as a proxy of a male’s sexual maturity, and evaluated its variation as a function of age
The sperm migration from the testicles to the seminal vesicles started between zero and five days, when we could observe a greater number of sperm bundles in the seminal vesicles, and a few free sperm cells
Between 10 and 15 days after emergence, following which, total sperm cells was similar to subsequent age categories (KW-H (5;55) = 36.425; p < 0.001), and the increment in this number was followed by simultaneous improvement in flight ability (Fig 1a)

Summary

Introduction

Over the last 50 years, the life histories of male stingless bees (Apidae: Meliponini) have been documented in great detail (Nogueira-Neto, 1954; Kerr et al, 1962; Van Veen et al, 1997; Koffler et al, 2016; Schorkopf, 2016), showing that male behaviors and reproductive strategies are diverse and very different of Apini (Engels & ImperatrizFonseca, 1990; Paxton, 2005). Males leave the nests after they reach sexual maturity (Van Veen et al, 1997), before forming reproductive aggregations in specific sites (Paxton, 2005).

Results

Conclusion