母体亲缘关系在杨氏榕树金小蜂后代性比调节中的作用

局域配偶竞争(local mate competition, LMC)理论问世以来在很多方面获得了发展,其中一个观点就是相互作用的繁殖母体之间的亲缘关系越近,后代性比越低,即产生更多的雌性后代。本研究以西双版纳广泛分布的钝叶榕Ficus curtipes上寄生的非传粉小蜂杨氏榕树金小蜂Diaziella yangi为研究对象,研究在同一榕果上产卵的繁殖雌蜂之间的亲缘关系对后代性比的影响。处理1：在同一榕果产卵的2头繁殖雌蜂来自蜂源1号树的同一个榕果;处理2：在同一榕果产卵的2头繁殖雌蜂来自蜂源2号树的同一个榕果,处理3：在同一榕果上产卵的2头繁殖蜂分别来自1、2号蜂源树。实验结果却显示出与理论预测值不一致。实验结果中,具有姐妹关系的2头繁殖雌蜂的2个处理的后代性比分别为0.195±0.028和0.189±0.043;亲缘关系较远的2头繁殖雌蜂的后代性比为0.240±0.030;不同处理的后代性比并没有显著差异。说明杨氏榕树金小蜂没有识别相互作用的繁殖雌蜂之间的亲缘关系以及据此调整后代性比的能力,这与其他大量研究 结果一致。     

The influence of developmental mortality on optimal sex allocation under local mate competition

In panmictic populations, optimal sex allocation is, under theassumptions of Fisher's model, not influenced by the probabilityof offspring developmental mortality, or by differences in mortalitybetween the sexes. In contrast, when mating opportunities areconfined to siblings, developmental mortality can influenceoptimal sex allocation. Many animal species have both localmating and developmental mortality. We show that when developmentalmortality is random for individual offspring, optimal sex allocationis influenced by mortality among males but not among females.Male mortality increases the allocation to males, but this shouldnever be male biased, even under extreme male mortality. Thisresult applies both when mothers are able to control the sexof individual offspring precisely, and when sex is allocatedwith binomial probability. The influence of mortality becomesprogressively larger when the variance of the distribution ofmortality over clutches diminishes. The reduction in fitnessis greater than the proportion of mortality, especially at smallclutch sizes, and mortality reduces the advantage of producingprecise sex ratios, and of local mate competition in general.     

A Comparative Study of Sex Ratio and Clutch Size in Gregarious Ichneumonoid Wasps

Some convincing support for sex ratio theory comes from the cross-species relationship between sex ratio and brood size in gregarious bethylid wasps (Hymenoptera: Bethylidae), in which the proportion males declines as brood size increases as predicted under local mate competition. It is unknown how widely such relationships hold within parasitoid wasps as a whole. We assemble a dataset on sex ratio and brood size for gregarious Braconidae and Ichneumonidae. Their sex ratios deviate substantially from those of bethylids; sex ratios differ widely across species; and they are not significantly related to brood size across species. Several factors explain the heterogeneity in sex ratios including across-species differences in mating system, sex determining mechanism, and sexual asymmetries in larval competition and polyembryony leading to single-sexed broods.     

Female-biased sex ratios under local mate competition: An experimental confirmation

Summary Experimental work of Nadel and Luck (1992) on a chalcidoid wasp provides a confirmation of sex ratio theory under local mate competition.     

Combined effects of host quality and local mate competition on sex allocation inLariophagus distinguendus

Summary Many parasitoid wasps are known to adjust sex ratio in response to either local mate competition (LMC) or host quality. Nevertheless, few studies have investigated the combined effects of these two factors on sex allocation. The sex allocation pattern inLariophagus distinguendus, a parasitoid of granary weevil larvae, is contrasted to the expectations of Werren's (1984) model combining LMC and host quality. Several predictions of the model are confirmed, but others are not. Sex ratio on both large and small hosts declines with proportion of small hosts attacked in a manner consistent with the model. However, when only one host size is parasitized, sex ratio is not independent of that host size, as predicted by the model. Various possibilities for the deviation between expected and observed are discussed. A partial LMC/host quality model is developed which allows for some matings outside the natal patch, and predictions of this model conform more closely to the pattern observed inL. distinguendus. Finally, the application of parasitoid studies to basic questions in evolutionary ecology is briefly discussed.     

Dispersal and mating structure of a parasitoid with a female-biased sex ratio: Implications for theory

Summary Species of parasitic Hymenoptera that manifest female-biased sex ratios and whose offspring mate only with the offspring of the natal patch are assumed to have evolved biased sex ratios because of Local Mate Competition (LMC). Off-patch matings, i.e. outcrossing, are inconsistent with the conditions favouring biased sex ratios because they foster a mating structure approaching panmixia. Such a mating structure favours parents who invest equally in daughters and sons, assuming the production of each sex is of equal cost.Pachycrepoideus vindemiae (Rondani) is a solitary pupal parasitoid of patchily distributed frugivorousDrosophila, whose offspring manifest a female-biased sex ratio. Thus this species appears to manifest a population structure and progeny sex ratio consistent with LMC. However, preliminary observations and subsequent greenhouse experiments suggest that the males participate in off-patch matings and that this propensity is unlikely to be an experimental artefact. FemaleP. vindemiae dispersed from patches in which either the males were lacking (12% of the emigrant females), both resident (sibling) and immigrant males were present (23% of the females), only immigrant males were present (14% of the females), or their opportunity to mate could not be determined (14% of the females). Of the 12% that emigrated from a patch lacking males, an estimated 7% mated at an oviposition site and 5% remained unmated, presumably because they arrived at an oviposition site that lacked males before they were dissected to determine whether they were inseminated. Thus the degree of bias in the sex ratios of the progeny (18% males), coupled with the suggested outcrossing potential from the experiments (26–37%), is inconsistent with the assumptions of LMC or variants of it, i.e. asynchronous brood maturation. Thus the explanation for a biased sex ratio in the offspring ofP. vindemiae remains a conundrum. More importantly,P. vindemiae does not appear to be an isolated example.     

Female-biased sex ratio in a wild bruchid seed-predator, Kytorhinus sharpianus. I. Larval competition and other factors

Abstract.

• 1 A wild bruchid seed-predator, Kytorhinus sharpianus, has a complex life cycle consisting of bi- and trivoltinism on a wild leguminous plant, Sophola flavescens. Observations of adults showed significant female-biased sex ratios (from 1:2 to 1:6) for nine generations over 4 years.
• 2 To investigate the potential effects of larval competition on the sex ratio, we altered the number of hatched eggs per seed and counted emergent males and females under laboratory conditions. Although only one adult could emerge per seed, the ratio of the females that emerged increased with the number of hatched eggs per seed. However, the sex ratio was not significantly different from 1:1 in the case of one hatched egg per seed.
• 3 We dissected seeds bearing two hatched eggs at regular intervals, and classified the surviving and the dead larvae according to their developmental stage. Over time, one larva within each seed always survived, while the other larva died from the second to fourth instar before the seed resource became exhausted.
• 4 In order to study the effects of the difference in the stages of two larvae in a seed on the emergence sex ratio, we manipulated intervals between the first and second ovipositions in the laboratory. As the difference in developmental stages of the two larvae increased, the closer to 1:1 the emergence sex ratio became.
• 5 Field observations, however, showed that about 60% of infested seeds were bored by only one K.sharpianus larva. This suggests that female dominance in larval competition within a seed may be relatively unimportant in causing the female-biased sex ratio in the field.

     

Sex-ratios of the wasp Nasonia vitripennis from self-versus conspecifically-parasitized hosts: local mate competition versus host quality models

Sex ratio patterns in the parasitoid wasp Nasonia vitripennis are frequently cited in support of a major group of evolutionary sex ratio models referred to as local mate competition (LMC) models. It has been shown repeatedly that, as predicted by LMC models, females generally oviposit a greater proportion of sons in previously parasitized hosts than in unparasitized hosts. However, this sex ratio pattern is also a prediction of another group of sex ratio models, the host quality models. Here I test a prediction of LMC models that is not also a prediction of host quality models: a female should produce a greater proportion of sons when she parasitizes a host previously parasitized by a conspecific female than when she parasitizes a host previously parasitized by herself. Females made this predicted distinction between self- and conspecifically-parasitized hosts under some conditions. There was no evidence that a female recognizes a self-parasitized host when her exposure to the host is interrupted by exposure to an unparasitized host, or that a female can distinguish between hosts parasitized by sisters versus nonsisters.     

寄生蜂性别分配行为

寄生蜂是性比分配行为领域的研究热点对象,其性别决定方式为单双倍型,一般情况下,未受精的单倍型卵发育成雄蜂,受精的二倍型卵发育为雌蜂。局部配偶竞争和近交等因素使得偏雌性比成为这类生物的进化稳定策略;其性比具有可调节性,产卵个体可以根据对产卵环境的判定来调控后代性比,从而获得最大适合度。在此基础上形成的局部配偶竞争理论阐述了寄生蜂性比的这种可调节性,成为进化论的优秀论据。