Group decision making during queen production in colonies of highly eusocial bees

Abstract

Colonies of social insects make numerous group decisions about foraging, nest maintenance, and reproduction. Queen production is a task whereby a colony's workers may exercise choices over which individuals to rear as gynes (unmated queens) and which gynes will survive to ultimately become queens. Here we assess the potential for how colonies of highly eusocial bees may exhibit such group decisions by reviewing the behaviors of stingless bee and honey bee workers during the gyne rearing, emergence, and elimination stages of queen production. We demonstrate that although the specific mechanisms whereby such decisions are manifested may vary among the taxa, there is a high potential for group decision making during queen production in eusocial bees. Given the importance of a queen to the inclusive fitness of all nestmates, such group decisions are likely to have a profound influence on the reproductive success of highly eusocial bee colonies. We briefly entertain the evolutionary mechanisms that may have shaped these group decision-making processes.