title: Mating and longevity in ant males.
abstract: Across multicellular organisms, the costs of reproduction and self-maintenance result in a life history trade-off between fecundity and longevity. Queens of perennial social Hymenoptera are both highly fertile and long-lived, and thus, this fundamental trade-off is lacking. Whether social insect males similarly evade the fecundity/longevity trade-off remains largely unstudied. Wingless males of the ant genusCardiocondylastay in their natal colonies throughout their relatively long lives and mate with multiple female sexuals. Here, we show thatCardiocondyla obscuriormales that were allowed to mate with large numbers of female sexuals had a shortened life span compared to males that mated at a low frequency or virgin males. Although frequent mating negatively affects longevity, males clearly benefit from a "live fast, die young strategy" by inseminating as many female sexuals as possible at a cost to their own survival.
authors.affiliation: Zoology/Evolutionary Biology University of Regensburg Regensburg Germany; IST Austria (Institute of Science and Technology Austria) Klosterneuburg Austria.
authors.forename: Sina
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Metzler
authors.affiliation: Zoology/Evolutionary Biology University of Regensburg Regensburg Germany.
authors.forename: Jürgen
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Heinze
authors.affiliation: Zoology/Evolutionary Biology University of Regensburg Regensburg Germany.
authors.forename: Alexandra
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Schrempf
keywords: Cardiocondyla; life span; reproduction; trade‐off