The effect of intra and interspecific pheromones on the behavior of different formicine ant species

Abstract

Pheromone trails are known to play an important role in influencing the behavior of many social insects. Ants in particular use them for navigation and as a way to direct other members of their colonies to a specific resource. Here, we created artificial pheromone trails of Formica subsericea and used them to monitor the behavioral responses of four different groups of ants: a source colony of F. subsericea, a second colony of F. subsericea, Formica pergandei, and Camponotus herculeans. We observed the strongest positive response in the slave-making ants F. pergandei and the strongest negative response in the second colony of F. subsericea. We propose that these results reflect the ecological relationships between the treatment groups rather than the phylogenetic relationships. Slave-making ants as social parasites need to use heterospecific pheromones to find hosts, and F. subsericea ants avoid intercolonial pheromone trails, as an encounter with another colony would likely result in hostility.