Atividade de forrageio e produtividade colonial da vespa enxameante Apoica pallens (Fabricius, 1804)

Abstract

Swarm-founding social wasps are dominant in the neotropical region, and studies on these organisms allow a better understanding of the evolution of sociality. Most of the human communities don’t know about the contribution of these organisms as pollinators and natural enemies of insect pests, being only able to see the risk of accidents related to the wasps, which motivates the destruction of wasp colonies. Among the swarm founding species, the Apoica genus stands out due to its night foraging habit and to its nest architecture, composed of a single exposed comb built directly on the substrate, without a peduncle. The species Apoica pallens is commonly found in the Minas Gerais state and, due to the lack of information, this study aimed to build knowledge on the species’ foraging habits, characterizing its foraging activity, captured prey, colony productivity and nesting substrate. Results showed that the species’ foraging activity period comprehends a 12-hour amplitude. Among the captured prey, more than 90% of the samples were represented by Lepidoptera caterpillars. Nest dissection showed that productive cells were located in the nest’s center; the number of adults produced by cell/ total cell number rate was 0.62, which suggests low utilization of cells for producing adults. Colonies were found in areas with low anthropic pressure and usually near to hydric resources; the nesting substrates weren’t specific, showing a broad utilization of vegetal species. Our results make up a set of information that will fill a gap in the literature, motivating further studies on A. pallens.