Dispersal of first "workers" in social wasps: causes and implications of an alternative reproductive strategy

Many "workers" in north temperate colonies of the eusocial paper wasp Polistes fuscatus disappear within a few days of eclosion. We provide evidence that these females are pursuing an alternative reproductive strategy, i.e., dispersing to overwinter and become nest foundresses the following spring, instead of helping to rear brood on their natal nests. A female is most likely to stay and help at the natal nest (i.e., least likely to disperse) when it is among the first workers to emerge and when it emerges on a nest with more pupae (even though worker-brood relatedness tends to be lower in such colonies). The latter cause may result from the fact that pupae-laden nests are especially likely to survive, and thus any direct or indirect reproductive payoffs for staying and working are less likely to be lost. Disappearing females are significantly smaller than predicted if dispersal tendency was independent of body size (emergence order-controlled), suggesting that the females likely to be most effective at challenging for reproductive rights within the natal colony (i.e., the largest females) are also most likely to stay. Thus, early dispersal is conditional on a female's emergence order, the maturity of its natal nest, and its body size. Finally, we present evidence that foundresses may actively limit the sizes of first-emerging females, perhaps to decrease the probability that the latter can effectively challenge foundresses for reproductive rights. The degree to which foundresses limit the size of first-emerging females accords well with the predictions of the theory of staying incentives.