Do queen-right colonies show different foraging patterns than colonies without queens? I am looking for any evidence of the influence of queens on foraging and activity patterns in the genus Formica or any other ant species. Any literature you may know of would be greatly appreciated. Thanks
Dear Israel Del Toro!
You may try to have a look at paper: DOMISH et al. 2009: Foraging aktivity and dietary spektrum of wood ants (Formica rufa group) and their role in nutritient fluxes in boreal forests. – Ecological Entomology 34: 369-377
Possibly the best thing to do is to contact the autors.
There are also some older papers on wood ant foraging from 1980´s and 90´s in German - try to find work of Horstmann, Coenen-Strass or Kneitz.
However as I know there are usualy no natural colonies of Formica nests permanently without queen since polygyny is very common in those species.
Herbers and Choiniere 1996 (Foraging behaviour and colony structure in ants) report that ants from queenless colonies move slightly faster.
Portha et al 2004 (How food type and brood influence foraging decisions of Lasius niger scouts) found that the presence of brood doesn’t affect sugar drinking: ants almost always drink sugar. Food type and brood presence affect prop of laying ants, but not number of lays per ant. The proportion of ants laying pheromone to sugar solution food is higher in colonies with brood, from 65% to 84% laying. Same pattern with protienacious food (35% and 61% for without and with, respectively). But with sugar the difference was non-significant, and with protein barely significant (0.044, with a one tailed test).
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