No kin discrimination in female mate choice of a parasitoid with complementary sex determination

Discrimination against kin as mates, via genetic or environmentally derived cues of relatedness, can prevent inbreeding and thus enhance individual fitness and promote population survival. Sex in the parasitoid wasp Cotesia glomerata L. (Hymenoptera: Braconidae) is determined by one locus with multiple alleles, a mechanism termed single-locus complementary sex determination (sl-CSD). Under sl-CSD, haploid individuals are males, whereas diploid individuals are females when heterozygous at the sex determination locus but males when homozygous. In species with sl-CSD, inbreeding leads to increased incidence of matings between individuals sharing an allele at the sex locus and thus to increased diploid male production. Diploid males cause an undesirable sex ratio distortion and can be of inferior fitness. To evade these deleterious effects, species with sl-CSD are expected to avoid inbreeding. We investigated whether C. glomerata females discriminate against close kin as mating partners. We performed a mate choice experiment, which allowed us to distinguish between kin discrimination based on the perception of phenotype-related cues and kin discrimination based on the perception of cues associated with the developmental environment. As kin discrimination is often mediated through cuticular hydrocarbons (CHCs), we additionally examined composition of the CHC profiles of males. We found no evidence for discrimination against related or familiar males nor for differences in the CHC profiles of males. These results indicate that kin discrimination is not a relevant inbreeding avoidance strategy in C. glomerata. Copyright 2010, Oxford University Press.